Wearable scanner to shed light on how driving is affected by old age
A BRAIN scanner that is worn like a helmet is being used for the first time to investigate brain activity in elderly car drivers.
Research led by the University of Nottingham and funded by UK Quantum Technology Hub Sensors and Timing will explore how a driver’s thinking processes change with age.
The findings from this study could enable a new understanding of neural processing, which in turn will enable elderly people to receive treatment to help them keep driving, and therefore stay independenct, for longer.
The project uses brain imaging technology developed at the University of Nottingham known as OPMMEG, which has recently been commercialised by Nottingham spin-out company Cerca Magnetics Limited.
This system is lightweight, wearable, and can be held close to the scalp using a helmet-style design, allowing for significantly better sensitivity than current imaging technologies. The device will be used to provide highly accurate, real-time brain imaging for a group of volunteers who will be asked to navigate a realistic driving simulator through an urban setting with multiple hazards.
This will allow researchers to analyse their reactions. Recent evidence has shown that, although elderly people exhibit a decline in driving ability, they also demonstrate an increased mental effort to mitigate losses in performance.
Dr Matias Ison, project partner at the School of Psychology at the University of Nottingham, said: “We will have volunteers of different ages driving through a simulated environment and facing some of the issues that are critical in real driving, such as the sudden appearance of a pedestrian.
“We expect to ultimately find neural biomarkers of driving ‘fitness.’ Along with this, we also plan to investigate how visual search training can lead to improved driving performance.”
The Driving Vehicle Licensing Agency reports that there are around 4.5 million UK motorists over the age of 70. In 2015, 17,000 of these motorists were deemed unfit to drive.
Professor Matthew Brookes, hub researcher at the University of Nottingham, said: “For many years, neuroimaging has focused on understanding brain responses to simple tasks, such as finger movement.
“This is because undertaking naturalistic tasks, like driving, has been impossible to study in conventional scanners which are claustrophobic and require people to remain still for long periods.
“Now, for the first time, we have the wearable technology to begin to understand cognition, and its breakdown, whilst performing naturalistic tasks. We are excited to see where this new project will take us.”
UNIVERSITY STUDY TO EXAMINE BRAIN FUNCTIONS OF ELDERLY MOTORISTS