FAQ XenomatiX

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a solid-state lidar?

 

Traditional lidar systems rely on lasers that rotate to scan the area around it. The moving parts in the sensor make it more sensitive to perturbations caused by factors like driving through rough terrain or heavy rainfall. Therefore, the moving parts involved put a restriction on the size of the lidar, since attempts to make them small and compact increase the difficulties in the precise manufacturing required and further drive up cost.

A true solid-state lidar has no moving nor scanning parts at all, making the lidar more robust and scalable. Also, solid-state lidars are made from silicon chip technology which, not only makes them more resilient to vibrations but also allows them to be smaller in size. Today solid-state lidars are gaining traction over traditional lidars in automotive and autonomous applications in vehicles, robots and UAVs.

 

What is a digital twin?

The Digital Twin is an innovative tool that contributes to both cost and time savings and helps prioritize choices in road inspection, maintenance and road safety. Digital Twins are popping up in all sectors and are gaining popularity with national and local governments. With a 3D, 4D or 6D digital copy of the road network, you can virtually inspect the road from your computer and objectively monitor the deterioration of safety and comfort over time. Collecting digital copies of multiple assets, including the roads, bike paths and sewers, gives local authorities the necessary insights to better plan the required works and save budget.

 

What is 6D road scanning?

The lidar is mounted on top of a regular vehicle and digitize the road surface, collecting in total 6D outputs: 3D point clouds, surface reflectivity data (1D) and 2D camera images. All data is collected at normal driving speed, and annotated with detailed RTK gnss data. This short range lidar digitally measures the pavement with a resolution down to 5mm in driving and lateral direction. XenomatiX’ unique solution the ‘6D road scanning’, returns road condition measures based on objectively measured road data and allows to virtually analyse the road condition and find causes and repair solutions..

 

How do you define global accuracy?

Global accuracy refers to a 3D geometry, referenced to the absolute world coordinate system. So all data measured and analyzed is georeferenced and ready to import in any GIS system.

 

What is different/innovative in the Road LiDAR compared to alternative scanners?

The Road LiDAR is designed to measure in mm precision the road surface. Per frame measured, a full road surface of 4m x 4m is digitized in global shutter and consecutive measurements are taken at 40Hz. With all the individual frames with plenty of consecutive overlaps, an optimized digital road is constructed.

Since each frame is measuring a surface instead of a line, the algorithm doesn’t need any correction for the car movement like roll, pitch and yaw. With the overlap of surface data, any small car movement can be calculated and corrected without input required from an IMU or double laser set. In other systems, it is this car movement correction that accumulate errors and causes inaccuracy through the integration of acceleration measurements or combination of single laser point measurements.