Objective and Target

Driving simulators are powerful tools that permit the development of innovative systems in a complete safety way with the total control over the involved variables in any experiment and the complete replicability of the results makes them the perfect tools for the most varied studies, from healthy studies to application and industrial research.

Research field

Initially developed for training professional pilots or to implement in-vehicle systems, simulators have increasingly assumed the role of irreplaceable subjects for usability, safety and ergonomics studies. The multidisciplinary nature that the use of these tools requires, leads to a series of collaboration between of two departments of University of Padua, the Human Technology Laboratory (HTLab) and the Department of Information Engineering (DEI) with a leader company in simulator field, Vi-Grade, with the aim of make the simulator developed more and more immersive, realistic and technologically advanced, making it one of the most valuable tools of its kind.

Setting and Equipment

Our laboratory has therefore collaborated to a series of experiments within which, through cutting-edge devices able to detect physiological indices, it has been responsible for detecting levels of stress and cognitive load in drivers. Our equipment includes a high variety of sensors able to detect brain, ocular, electrodermal, heart, respiration, blood pressure and temperature activities, allowing us to get the best information for every situations.