  Although extensive research in emergency collision avoidance has been carried
out for straight or curved roads in a highway scenario, a general method that
could be implemented for all road environments has not been thoroughly
explored. Moreover, most current algorithms don't consider collision mitigation
in an emergency. This functionality is essential since the problem may have no
feasible solution. We propose a safe controller using model predictive control
and artificial potential function to address these problems. A new artificial
potential function inspired by line charge is proposed as the cost function for
our model predictive controller. The vehicle dynamics and actuator limitations
are set as constraints. The new artificial potential function considers the
shape of all objects. In particular, the artificial potential function we
proposed has the flexibility to fit the shape of the road structures, such as
the intersection. We could also realize collision mitigation for a specific
part of the vehicle by increasing the charge quantity at the corresponding
place. We have tested our methods in 192 cases from 8 different scenarios in
simulation with two different models. The simulation results show that the
success rate of the proposed safe controller is 20% higher than using
HJ-reachability with system decomposition by using a unicycle model. It could
also decrease 43% of collision that happens at the pre-assigned part. The
method is further validated in a dynamic bicycle model.
