In 2009, XIOPM and Science Research Institute, Ministry of Transport of the PRC founded the Joint Laboratory for Traffic and Optoelectronic Technology Application, which focuses on research of application of optoelectronic technology in the field of traffic. For the past several years, Joint Laboratory has obtained many important achievements in the fields of public traffic, disaster prevention and reduction and security assurance.

Recently, two projects “Development of Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Visibility Monitoring Equipment and Research of Precipitation Monitoring Technology” and “Research of Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Pavement Behavior Detection Equipment” concerning western traffic science and technology plan proposed by Ministry of Transport of the PRC and undertaken by Joint Laboratory passed the inspection and results appraisal by experts in Beijing. Inspecting experts gave high marks on the two projects and believed that the projects have generally reached the international advanced level, and part of research the international leading level, which laid the foundation for subsequent application and popularization of the projects as well as declaration of scientific and technological rewards.

“Development of Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Visibility Monitoring Equipment and Research of Precipitation Monitoring Technology” and “Research of Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Pavement Behavior Detection Equipment” are subprojects of “Highway Network Operation Status Monitoring and Efficiency Improvement Technology Based on Web of Things” proposed by Ministry of Transport of the People’s Republic of China as major scientific and technological project for the 12th Five-Year Plan. The project applies concept and technology of web of things, conducts research and development of key technologies and equipments relating to monitoring, transmitting, processing and distributing operation status information of regional arterial highway network, and provides information service about real-time operation status of highway network for users and administrators.

In the process of research and development, Traffic and Optoelectronic Technology Research Team of Joint Laboratory developed “Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Visibility Monitoring Sensor” and “Highway Traffic Meteorological Environment Pavement Behavior Detection Sensor”, both of which have independent intelligent property rights and successfully solve the technical problems which may appear in outfield like developing light source with high stability and detecting weak optoelectronic signal with high precision. The said sensors are able to monitor the visibility in hazy weather, the ponding and icy conditions in case of rain and snow or severer weather, which allows highway administration authority to offer safety driving suggestions. The sensors have passed the quality inspection from the third party. Relative research achievement has declared four national patents, of which two are patents for invention and two are authorized patents for utility models. The equipments now have been applied into demonstration engineering project of web of things of Chongqing expressway by Ministry of Transport of the PRC. Eight visibility sensors and six pavement sensors were installed within over 200km expressway. Having been operated for 1 years, the equipments works well and are well received by users.