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Safety continues to be one of the most important factors in motor vehicle design, manufacturing, and marketing.  This course provides a comprehensive overview of these critical automotive safety considerations: injury and anatomy; human tolerance and biomechanics; occupant protection; testing; and federal legislation. The knowledge shared at this course enables participants to be more aware of safety considerations and to better understand and interact with safety experts. This course has been approved by the Accreditation Commission for Traffic Accident Reconstruction (ACTAR) for 18 Continuing Education Units (CEUs).

Investigating human driver behavior enhances the acceptance of the autonomous driving and increases road safety in heterogeneous environments with human-operated and autonomous vehicles. The previously established driver fingerprint model, focuses on the classification of driving style based on CAN bus signals. However, driving styles are inherently complex and influenced by multiple factors, including changing driving environments and driver states. To comprehensively create a driver profile, an in-car measurement system based on the Driver-Driven vehicle-Driving environment (3D) framework is developed. The measurement system records emotional and physiological signals from the driver, including ECG signal and heart rate. A Raspberry Pi camera is utilized on the dashboard to capture the driver's facial expressions and a trained convolutional neural network (CNN) recognizes emotion. To conduct unobtrusive ECG measurements, an ECG sensor is integrated into the steering wheel.

This title includes the technical papers developed for the 2023 Stapp Car Crash Conference, the premier forum for the presentation of research in impact biomechanics, human injury tolerance, and related fields, advancing the knowledge of land-vehicle crash injury protection. The conference provides an opportunity to participate in open discussion about the causes and mechanisms of injury, experimental methods and tools for use in impact biomechanics research, and the development of new concepts for reducing injuries and fatalities in automobile crashes.

RAMBHA-LP (Radio Anatomy of Moon Bound Hypersensitive Ionosphere and Atmosphere - Langmuir Probe) is one of the key scientific payloads onboard the Indian Space Research Organization’s (ISRO) Chandrayaan-3 mission. Its objectives were to estimate the plasma density and its variations on the near lunar surface. The probe was initially kept in a stowed condition attached to the lander. A mechanism was designed and realized to meet the functional requirement of deploying the probe at a distance of 1 meter, equivalent to the Debye length of the probe in the moon’s plasma environment. The probe deployment mechanism consists of the Titanium alloy spherical probe with a Titanium Nitride coating on its surface to achieve a constant work function, a long carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer boom, a double torsion spring, a dust-protection box, and a shape-memory alloy-based Frangibolt actuator for low-shock separation. The entire mechanism weighed less than 1.5 kilograms.

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

Evolving to MedDev provides a new opportunity for executives in aerospace, automotive and medical devices companies to connect and develop long-term growth strategies and find ways to meet the increased short-term demand for medical supplies

The goal of this study was to gather and compare kinematic response and injury data on both female and male whole-body Post-mortem Human Surrogates (PMHS) responses to Underbody Blast (UBB) loading. Midsized males (50th percentile, MM) have historically been most used in biomechanical testing and were the focus of the Warrior Injury Assessment Manikin (WIAMan) program, thus this population subgroup was selected to be the baseline for female comparison. Both small female (5th percentile, SF) and large female (75th percentile, LF) PMHS were included in the test series to attempt to discern whether differences between male and female responses were predominantly driven by sex or size. Eleven tests, using 20 whole-body PMHS, were conducted by the research team. Preparation of the rig and execution of the tests took place at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds (APG) in Aberdeen, MD. Two PMHS were used in each test.

THOR-AV 5F, a modified THOR-5F dummy, was designed to represent both upright and reclined occupants in vehicle crashworthiness studies. The dummy was evaluated in four test conditions: a) 25° seatback, 15 km/h, b) 25° seatback, 32 km/h, c) 45° seatback, 15 km/h, d) 45° seatback, 32 km/h. The dummy’s biomechanical responses were compared against those of postmortem human subjects (PMHS) tested in the same test conditions. The latest National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) BioRank method was used to provide a biofidelity ranking score (BRS) for each data channel in the tests to assess the dummy’s biofidelity objectively. The evaluation was categorized into two groups: restraint system and dummy. In the four test conditions, the restraint system showed good biofidelity with BRS scores of 1.49, 1.47, 1.15, and 1.79, respectively.

The objectives of this study were to provide insights on how injury risk is influenced by occupant demographics such as sex, age, and size; and to quantify differences within the context of commonly-occurring real-world crashes. The analyses were confined to either single-event collisions or collisions that were judged to be well-defined based on the absence of any significant secondary impacts. These analyses, including both logistic regression and descriptive statistics, were conducted using the Crash Investigation Sampling System for calendar years 2017 to 2021. In the case of occupant sex, the findings agree with those of many recent investigations that have attempted to quantify the circumstances in which females show elevated rates of injury relative to their male counterparts given the same level bodily insult. This study, like others, provides evidence of certain female-specific injuries.

Frontal-crash sled tests were conducted to assess submarining protection and abdominal injury risk for midsized male occupants in the rear seat of modern vehicles. Twelve sled tests were conducted in four rear-seat vehicle-bucks with twelve post-mortem human surrogates (PMHS). Select kinematic responses and submarining incidence were compared to previously observed performance of the Hybrid III 50th-percentile male and THOR-50M ATDs (Anthropomorphic Test Devices) in matched sled tests conducted as part of a previous study. Abdominal pressure was measured in the PMHS near each ASIS (Anterior Superior Iliac Spine), in the inferior vena cava, and in the abdominal aorta. Damage to the abdomen, pelvis, and lumbar spine of the PMHS was also identified. In total, five PMHS underwent submarining. Four PMHS, none of which submarined, sustained pelvis fractures and represented the heaviest of the PMHS tested. Submarining of the PMHS occurred in two out of four vehicles.

With the current trend of including the evaluation of the risk of brain injuries in vehicle crashes due to rotational kinematics of the head, two injury criteria have been introduced since 2013 – BrIC and DAMAGE. BrIC was developed by NHTSA in 2013 and was suggested for inclusion in the US NCAP for frontal and side crashes. DAMAGE has been developed by UVa under the sponsorship of JAMA and JARI and has been accepted tentatively by the EuroNCAP. Although BrIC in US crash testing is known and reported, DAMAGE in tests of the US fleet is relatively unknown. The current paper will report on DAMAGE in NCAP-like tests and potential future frontal crash tests involving substantial rotation about the three axes of occupant heads. Distribution of DAMAGE of three-point belted occupants without airbags will also be discussed. Prediction of brain injury risks from the tests have been compared to the risks in the real world.

Understanding left-turn vehicle-pedestrian accident mechanisms is critical for developing accident-prevention systems. This study aims to clarify the features of driver behavior focusing on drivers’ gaze, vehicle speed, and time to collision (TTC) during left turns at intersections on left-hand traffic roads. Herein, experiments with a sedan and light-duty truck (< 7.5 tons GVW) are conducted under four conditions: no pedestrian dummy (No-P), near-side pedestrian dummy (Near-P), far-side pedestrian dummy (Far-P) and near-and-far side pedestrian dummies (NF-P). For NF-P, sedans have a significantly shorter gaze time for left-side mirrors compared with light-duty trucks. The light-duty truck’s average speed at the initial line to the intersection (L1) and pedestrian crossing line (L0) is significantly lower than the sedan’s under No-P, Near-P, and NF-P conditions, without any significant difference between any two conditions.

Purpose: This award celebrates the successes of women in the engineering profession and recognizes their leadership and technical contributions in the aerospace, automotive and commercial vehicle sectors. It serves to broaden the awareness of the reach and impact of women working in mobility engineering, and opening doors for young girls interested in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) who wish to pursue engineering careers. Rodica Baranescu, Ph.D. made a generous gift in 2011 to establish this award. Dr. Baranescu is Past President of SAE International, an SAE Fellow and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.  As a mechanical engineer, she began her professional and academic career in her native country, Romania, before immigrating to the United States in 1980 and was later the first woman elected President of SAE International in 2000.