On the enhancement of vehicle dynamics through torque vectoring and state estimation

Thanks to the advent of vehicle electrification, torque vectoring is a very interesting feature now more than ever before. Torque vectoring can be exploited in electric vehicles with multiple motors to, e.g., generate a direct yaw moment by assigning different motor torques at the left and right wheels.
This allows to modify the cornering response of the vehicle based on handling and/or energy efficiency criteria. Combining torque vectoring control with reliable estimates of key vehicle states will lead to devise new active safety systems to significantly improve passenger safety. Experimental results obtained on full-scale electric vehicles are presented.

Short bio

Basilio Lenzo is a tenure-track Assistant Professor with the Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Padova, Padua, Italy. Before this appointment, he was Senior Lecturer in Automotive Engineering at Sheffield Hallam University, UK. He was also a Visiting Researcher with many institutions, including the German Aerospace Center DLR, Germany, and Stanford University, USA, respectively with a DAAD and a Fulbright scholarship. His research interests include vehicle dynamics, torque vectoring, state estimation, control, and robotics.