Friday, May 4, 2012

Toyota Working on Mood Sensing Vehicles


So you had a long day huh?

If you take the time to look around at the other drivers on the road during your morning/afternoon commute you will see many different types of drivers. A common driver you might find in your morning commute is the one that is barely awake as he drives to work. On your afternoon commute you are more likely to find the angry road rage driver.

Both of these drivers can be bad news right? Well thanks to Toyota’s technological advancements we might soon be behind the wheel of vehicles capable of knowing if we are having a bad day or are falling asleep at the wheel.

Details of this technology were first revealed in 2006. Since then the idea has been built into a working vehicle capable of identifying the emotional state of a driver and react if needed.

Some of the actions the system can take include producing more safety reminders if the driver seems distracted or even directly controlling a vehicle by braking or steering to avoid an obstacle.

For example, angry drivers could be warned about potential hazards such as a pedestrian crossing the road much sooner than a calm driver. On top of that, the vehicle’s system is able to tell what direction the driver is facing in order to warn him/her of potential hazards located in the opposite direction that the driver is facing.

How Does it Work?

The technology behind these super smart cars works by using sensors that take readings from 238 different points all over the driver’s face and uses them to calculate his/her emotion. The benefits to these sensors is that the reading mechanism will work even if a driver’s face is partially covered, such as when wearing sunglasses.

At this point the technology is being perfected so that it can recognize what a driver is doing. The vehicle will be able to sense times where the driver is looking at their phone or controlling the radio and then offer to help so he or she can stay focused on the road.

As of this writing the technology is still in its early stages, however we could see aspects of it in Toyota’s cars in about six years.

Stay tuned.


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