US Patent 8704887 Multi-object appearance-enhanced fusion of camera and range sensor data

A transportation vehicle configured to track an object external to the vehicle. The vehicle includes a camera, a range sensor, and an on-board computer. The on-board computer includes a processor and a tangible, non-transitory, computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform select steps. The steps include determining that new-object data corresponding to the object is available based on input received from the sensor sub-system of the vehicle. The steps also include registering the new-object data and estimating an expected location and an expected appearance for the object according to a prediction algorithm to generate a predicted track corresponding to the object. The steps also include analyzing motion for the object including comparing the predicted track with any existing track associated with the object and stored in a database of the on-board computer.