Engineering news
Aimed at “radically” reducing the number of multi-vehicle crashes on motorways, the Multi-Car Collision Avoidance (MuCCA) R&D project used AI and vehicle-to-vehicle communications to instruct autonomous vehicles to cooperatively make decisions to avoid potential collisions.
Vehicles took part in exercises replicating real-life UK motorway scenarios on test tracks. When the on-board technology detected an incident, the cars shared information by radio links. On-board computers calculated the best manoeuvres to avoid the obstacles and then safely steered the agreed path to avoid an accident.
The MuCCA-equipped cars also avoided each other and removed the need to brake suddenly – which might have caused vehicles behind to drive into them.
Cranfield University developed the sensor and driving systems of the cars to make them more ‘human-like’ in their reactions.
Connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) are expected to become increasingly common within the next 10 years but there will be many non-autonomous human-driven vehicles. In the near-future, MuCCA-equipped vehicles could reportedly handle the added complexity of anticipating the likely behaviour of human drivers in an incident.
“The university is a pioneer in connected and autonomous vehicle engineering, and we were able to develop computer algorithms that help the cars to react in a more human-like way when avoiding collisions,” said Cranfield autonomous car engineer Ross Walker. “This can allow any potential accidents to be recognised in advance, and consequently avoided before they have a chance to begin developing.”
Autonomous car research fellow Icaro Bezerra-Viana from Cranfield said: “Computer simulations enabled us to model how human drivers behave on motorways, and how the proximity of surrounding cars influences their behaviour. The movement of the cars that surround a vehicle over the next few seconds can then be predicted in order to avoid a collision.”
The project was funded by Innovate UK and the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), and delivered by a consortium led by Applus Idiada with Cranfield University, Westfield Sports Cars, Cosworth, SBD Automotive and the Connected Places Catapult.
Want the best engineering stories delivered straight to your inbox? The Professional Engineering newsletter gives you vital updates on the most cutting-edge engineering and exciting new job opportunities. To sign up, click here.
Content published by Professional Engineering does not necessarily represent the views of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.