AUTONOMOUS CARS
Mind control
well as externally, so that the vehicle can interpret its surroundings and take actions based on such things as signals, the weather and the presence and position of other vehicles. The industry coined the generic “V2X” term to
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mean vehicle-to-anything communications. While initially, the “X” represented other vehicles or infrastructure, the abbreviation has since spawned other variants as connectivity increases, such as vehicle-to-grid (V2G) to describe the relationship between electric cars and the electrical distribution network.
PLUG-IN HUMANS At this year’s glitzy Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nissan surprised many and shocked a few with its announcement of brain-to-vehicle (B2V) connectivity, linking the driver’s thought patterns to the vehicle control unit (VCU). While the ultimate aim of autonomy is to
disconnect the human entirely from the process of driving the car, Nissan is sure that gaining an understanding of human thought patterns while behind the wheel will aid developers to create more reliable and human-like autonomy. Meanwhile, even without fully driverless control,
linking the brain to vehicular logic will help the car to learn human responses and provide predictive
fundamental requirement for autonomous vehicles of any kind is connectivity. Modern cars are becoming increasingly connected, both internally between sensors and control units, as
Jonathan Newell finds out how Nissan is taking the realms of vehicle connectivity to new heights by plugging the driver’s brain into the equation
control functions, such as priming the brakes in anticipation of the driver’s foot reaching the pedal.
BRAIN SIGNAL INTERPRETATION Nissan describes its B2V technology as a method of enabling the vehicle to interpret signals from the driver’s brain and thereby redefine how people interact with their cars. The technology is expected to speed up reaction
times for drivers and will lead to cars that keep adapting to make driving more enjoyable. The key to the usefulness of the research is the adaptability of the VCU resulting from the interpretation of driver brain signals. All drivers react differently, particularly in difficult
conditions. On the other hand, computer control units are designed to react predictably and repeatably, something which isn’t the best approach in a task that has so many variables and which relies to a large extent on judgement rather than pre- defined algorithms. Understanding driver reactions in the most difficult situations can help machines to learn behaviours in a more adaptable way. Drivers don’t always make the correct decisions
and with a wealth of measured responses, there’s the opportunity for machines to learn from mistakes and build-in “safe option” judgements for those difficult decisions that sometimes make drivers indecisive. The B2V technology from Nissan is the result of
research into using brain decoding technology to predict a driver’s actions and detect discomfort, essential aspects in learning behaviour patterns.
March 2018 /// Environmental Engineering /// 27
❱❱ Monitoring the brain activity of drivers as they use their judgement to make decisions can help to enhance the algorithms for autonomous control
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