A ray-tracing approach for simulating recognition abilities of active infrared sensor arrays

The construction and setup of sensors or sensor arrays determines their maximum resolution and recognition abilities. Therefore, the analysis of certain setups is an important and mandatory task during the design process of a new sensor system. This paper deals with the simulation and evaluation of the recognition abilities of active infrared sensors for autonomous systems. Additionally, the simulation method as well as the results provide useful information for other applications, where infrared sensors are used. The simulation method is based on a Monte Carlo algorithm, which uses ray tracing to calculate the impulse response of the optical channel consisting of the sending and receiving components and the environment. In order to allow a fast simulation of several configurations, an efficient and flexible computation is realized. This means that all rays contribute maximally to the final result, and different sensor characteristics can easily be calculated. Extensive experiments are carried out, and the results show different evaluation options.