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Cows are a common sight on Indian roads and highways and two engineers may have come up with a solution to help drivers deal with these four-legged obstacles.
Researchers at Gujarat Technological University have developed an automatic obstacle detection and alert system to help cars avoid colliding with cows on roads – similar to the way driverless vehicle technology works.
Designed by researchers Sachin Sharma and Dharmesh Shah, the system uses dashboard cameras and algorithms that can determine whether an object near the vehicle is a cow and whether it represents a risk to the vehicle.
When the system detects a cow on the road, it triggers an audio or visual indicator to alert the driver to use the brakes – even if they haven’t seen the animal themselves.
The researchers say their algorithm is still in need of some tweaking and has not factored in night-time driving, but they believe their technology could play a role in helping reduce traffic accidents in the country.
Research is published in the International Journal of Vehicle Autonomous Systems.
