Patent ID: 7478527

Claim:
An apparatus to estimate the rate of particulate produced from an engine, the apparatus comprising: a conditions module, the conditions module configured to determine the status of at least one engine operating condition; a marker module, the marker module configured to determine a particulate production marker corresponding to the operating condition status; and an interpolation module, the interpolation module configured to interpolate between a high particulate production rate of the engine and a low particulate production rate of the engine according to the particulate production marker, thereby estimating the engine's rate of particulate production; wherein the marker module is configured to determine a plurality of particulate production markers based on a plurality of engine operating conditions, and further comprising a marker combination module, the marker combination module configured to combine the particulate production markers into a combined marker, and wherein the interpolation module is configured to interpolate between the high particulate production rate and the low particulate production rate according to the combined marker to determine a primary particulate production rate.