Large Multimodal Models for Embodied Intelligent Driving: The Next Frontier in Self-Driving?

TL;DR

This paper proposes a hybrid decision framework combining large multimodal models and deep reinforcement learning to enhance embodied intelligent driving, enabling continuous learning and joint decision-making for autonomous vehicles.

Contribution

It introduces a novel semantics and policy dual-driven hybrid framework integrating LMMs and DRL for improved autonomous driving capabilities.

Findings

Framework outperforms existing methods in lane-change planning tasks

Enables continuous learning through embodied AI interactions

Facilitates joint decision-making for autonomous driving systems

Abstract

The advent of Large Multimodal Models (LMMs) offers a promising technology to tackle the limitations of modular design in autonomous driving, which often falters in open-world scenarios requiring sustained environmental understanding and logical reasoning. Besides, embodied artificial intelligence facilitates policy optimization through closed-loop interactions to achieve the continuous learning capability, thereby advancing autonomous driving toward embodied intelligent (El) driving. However, such capability will be constrained by relying solely on LMMs to enhance EI driving without joint decision-making. This article introduces a novel semantics and policy dual-driven hybrid decision framework to tackle this challenge, ensuring continuous learning and joint decision. The framework merges LMMs for semantic understanding and cognitive representation, and deep reinforcement learning (DRL) for real-time policy optimization. We start by introducing the foundational principles of EI driving and LMMs. Moreover, we examine the emerging opportunities this framework enables, encompassing potential benefits and representative use cases. A case study is conducted experimentally to validate the performance superiority of our framework in completing lane-change planning task. Finally, several future research directions to empower EI driving are identified to guide subsequent work.