An hybrid simulation tool for autonomous cars in very high traffic scenarios

This article introduces an open source tool for simulating autonomous vehicles in complex, high traffic, scenarios. The proposed approach consists on creating an hybrid simulation, which fully integrates and synchronizes two well known simulators: A microscopic, multi-modal traffic simulator and a complex 3D simulator. The presented software tool allows to simulate an autonomous vehicle, including all its dynamics, sensors and control layers, in a scenario with a very high volume of traffic. The hybrid simulation creates a bi-directional integration, meaning that, in the 3D simulator, the ego-vehicle sees and interacts with the rest of the vehicles, and at the same time, in the traffic simulator, all additional vehicles detect and react to the actions of the ego-vehicle. Two interfaces, one for each simulator, where created to achieve the integration, they ensure the synchronization of the scenario, the state of all vehicles including the ego-vehicle, and the time. The capabilities of the hybrid simulation was tested with different models for the ego-vehicle and almost 300 additional vehicles in a complex merge scenario.