Localization by vision

1. A system comprising:

an encoded data set configured to store a plurality of information relating to a surrounding area, wherein said encoded data set is presented in a vision sensor readable format along with human readable information on an infrastructure element; and

an optical sensor configured to (i) locate and read said encoded data set and (ii) calculate a distance to said infrastructure element based on said information relating to said surrounding area, wherein (a) said distance is used to augment a current position of a vehicle with position information read from a second sensor to provide localization in an autonomous driving application and (b) said augmented position calibrates said position information read from said second sensor by generating a set of coefficients to transform data received from the optical sensor.

2. The system according to claim 1 , wherein a GPS coordinate of said infrastructure element is calibrated and stored during installation of the infrastructure element.

3. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said encoded data set comprises machine readable code.

4. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said encoded data set comprises a QR code having a predefined size selected to allow reading by said sensor.

5. The system according to claim 4 , wherein said QR code has a predefined size selected to allow reading during movement of an autonomous vehicle.

6. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said encoded data set is positioned along with other infrastructure elements.

7. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said optical sensor is implemented as a component of an autonomous vehicle.

8. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said calculation is performed by a processor.

9. The system according to claim 8 , wherein said information read from said second sensor comprises Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) data.

10. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said optical sensor includes an infrared sensor.

11. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said information comprises distance to one or more infrastructure elements.

12. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said information comprises angles to one or more infrastructure elements.

13. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said human readable information comprises one or more road markings.

14. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said information comprises information about nearby encoded data sets expected to be on other infrastructure elements.

15. The system according to claim 1 , wherein a plurality of encoded data sets read from a plurality of infrastructure elements are used for continual localization.

16. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said calibration of said position information comprises generating trend information to refine the calibration.

17. A system comprising:

an encoded data set configured to store a plurality of information relating to a surrounding area, wherein said encoded data set is presented in a vision sensor readable format along with human readable information on an infrastructure element; and

a sensor configured to (i) locate said encoded data set and (ii) calculate a distance to said infrastructure element based on said information relating to said surrounding area, wherein (a) said distance is used to provide localization in an autonomous vehicle application and (b) said information comprises information about nearby encoded data sets expected to be on other infrastructure elements.

18. The system according to claim 1 , wherein said calculation is performed by a processor.