Department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics, and Systems Engineering, University of Genova, Via Pastore 3, Genova 16132, Italy; Simulation and Advanced Education Center, University of Genova, Via all'Opera Pia 13, Genova 16145, Italy.
Department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics, and Systems Engineering, University of Genova, Via Pastore 3, Genova 16132, Italy.
Comput Methods Programs Biomed. 2022 Jun;221:106857. doi: 10.1016/j.cmpb.2022.106857. Epub 2022 May 10.
Independent living and transportation are crucial aspects for people living with a disability. After an injury, it is important to assess driving ability, in terms of physical and psychological conditions, and to test the effects of prescribed drugs. Within this framework, driving simulators are suitable tools for training driving skills; however, available tools are expensive or lack appropriate sets of behavioral measures to fully characterize the drivers' ability.
This work presents the first step toward the development of ADRIS, a new open-source, accessible, realistic virtual reality simulator for training and testing driving skills of people with sensory-motor disability. This includes a prototype based on an open-source simulator for autonomous driving research (CARLA), with the addition of customized features such as adaptable driving controllers, a virtual reality headset, and the possibility to collect behavioral and physiological data. Also, the new system allows to set different environmental conditions, to include and control the timing of potentially dangerous situations, and to set scenarios with various difficulty levels.
Tests on 17 healthy participants demonstrated that the simulator is well tolerated in terms of discomfort, physical fatigue, and mental effort. Also, the system is easy to use and is capable of providing a realistic driving experience, allowing the extraction of reliable behavioral parameters.
ADRIS combines a high-fidelity virtual world, with customizable features specifically designed for the training and testing of people living with a disability, thus making it usable in many contexts such as home training, rehabilitation, education, and research.
独立生活和交通对残疾人士至关重要。受伤后，评估身体和心理状况下的驾驶能力，并测试规定药物的效果非常重要。在这种情况下，驾驶模拟器是训练驾驶技能的合适工具；然而，现有的工具要么价格昂贵，要么缺乏适当的行为措施来全面描述驾驶员的能力。
这项工作是开发 ADRIS 的第一步，ADRIS 是一个新的开源、可访问、现实的虚拟现实模拟器，用于训练和测试感官运动障碍人士的驾驶技能。这包括一个基于自动驾驶研究开源模拟器（CARLA）的原型，增加了可适应的驾驶控制器、虚拟现实耳机等定制功能，并且可以收集行为和生理数据。此外，新系统允许设置不同的环境条件，包括和控制潜在危险情况的时机，并设置具有不同难度级别的场景。
对 17 名健康参与者的测试表明，该模拟器在不适感、身体疲劳和精神疲劳方面耐受性良好。此外，该系统易于使用，并能够提供逼真的驾驶体验，从而能够提取可靠的行为参数。
ADRIS 将高保真的虚拟世界与专门为残疾人士的培训和测试设计的可定制功能相结合，因此可在家庭培训、康复、教育和研究等许多场景中使用。
