Developing Intelligent Multimodal IVI Systems to Reduce Driver Distraction.

As research into autonomous vehicles gets mainstream, automobile manufacturers are trying to reinvent the ways we operate and interact with our vehicles. This is now more evident in the central instrument clusters than ever before. While some manufacturers are focusing on adding touchscreens to replace most in-vehicular infotainment (IVI) controls, others are trying to make the IVIS smarter and multimodal. Unfortunately, the lack of reliable tactile feedback for touchscreen interaction in IVI systems can be a major issue. Although this may not be a critical flaw in mobile device interaction, it can be a dangerous limitation for in-car systems where visual distraction can be fatal. For this reason, our research* is focused on exploring and developing new methods of providing tactile actuation using both vibrotactile and pneumatic feedback techniques.