A research team of Nottingham Trent University is working on a latest safety system to alert sleepy drivers and save thousands of human lives. The unique idea has proposed and is working on it is actually very simple; just monitor the driver’s heart rate and alert the driver if he’s started to doze off.
The researchers are planning to make this happen by incorporating sensors into the car seats. A United Kingdom company, “Plessey Semiconductors” is collaborating with the university on this exclusive project and has been successful in making use of capacitive sensors that were mounted on a driver’s seat and were able to measure and relay the cardiac signals of the driver.
Therefore, the system requires to flat, alike really flat, and inconspicuous and the researchers are suggesting to make use of a textile that will have the sensors embedded into it rather than attaching devices onto the existing car seats. The researchers are already come up with a prototype, though, in words of the team; we still need some time to improve the reliability and dependability of the data so that it can be used for the intended purpose.
In short, the data collection and data analyzing requires to be worked upon further to create the process seamless and work without mistake. I guess now many of you’ll think of the question that what’ll a simple warning do? The driver might still opt to carry on driving and disregard the alerts. Well, folks, you all know very well, we’re living in a technology era and if the driver selects to ignore the alert, the system will engage the cruise control and lane departure systems.
Perhaps who knows they might also enhance with smart brakes to the system in order to make sure that the driver is forced to pull over and not drive while being sleepy. The project has already been acknowledged a funding of $151,046 from the Technology Strategy Board and we’ve our fingers crossed to understand how this works out. There’s no time frame yet, but announcement, as to when this’ll be commercialized or used in automobiles but we sure are looking forward to see that happening.
