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NISSAN CREATES VIRTUAL BACK SEAT DRIVER, ONE YOU WON'T WANT TO KICK! |
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Nissan is developing technology that can predict when a driver is about to make a dangerous manoeuvre, such as overtaking into oncoming traffic.
By monitoring behaviour, the car builds up a picture of what the driver will do next and if need be activates warning or override systems to prevent an accident. Driving simulation tests showed the Nissan system to be nearly 100 per cent accurate at predicting drivers' moves for 12 seconds ahead. Nissan researcher, Andrew Liu is responsible for the project. He said: "This research is a very exciting development. It all began with the concept of tracking eye movement, in order to detect drowsiness. Our virtual back seat driver will stop drivers making potentially fatal mistakes and be a major contributor to road safety." The research was a joint project between Nissan and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The predictive system relies on the fact that driver behaviour can be broken down into long chains of simple commands and actions. To make its prediction the car uses a computer to process information from sensors on the steering wheel, accelerator and brake. When a pattern emerges, the system predicts the most likely action to follow. The prediction technique is similar to that used in speech recognition PC software. The system continuously updates the probabilities of next actions, so it can adapt to new drivers' styles. According to the Department of Transport, there were 236,923 road accidents in the UK last year caused by driver error, which resulted in 3421 deaths. Some 5,400 people are employed directly by Nissan in the UK. The company's operations include vehicle styling, manufacturing, distribution and sales, industrial machinery and finance. The main European centre for research and development is Nissan European Technology Centre in Cranfield, Bedfordshire. |
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