EMMA4Drive – Dynamic human model for autonomous driving

• Applicant: Professor Dr.-Ing. Jörg Fehr
• Subject Area: Mechanics
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 440904784

About 68 percent of all German employees commute to their workplace by car without being able to pursue a meaningful activity. In the future, occupants of autonomous vehicles will perform new activities, such as regeneration exercises, working or consuming entertainment media. New (software) tools are needed to understand the expectations of the customers, to show new possibilities of use and to strengthen trust. At the same time, the safety and comfort of the passengers must be guaranteed. The aim of this project is to further develop the muscle-activated multibody human model EMMA (Ergo-dynamic Moving Manikin) for use in (semi-)autonomous vehicles of the next generation by transferring knowledge from previous projects of SimTech (EXC 310). The resulting software prototype EMMA4Drive, as a digital representation of the occupant, will be capable of analysing and evaluating safety and ergonomics equally during driving manoeuvres under dynamic loads. This requires model-reduced simulations of the interactions between human soft tissues and the vehicle seat. Validation experiments will be used to evaluate the developed methods.The ITM has already carried out extensive preliminary work in the fields of active human modelling, vehicle safety and model reduction. The ITWM contributes to the project its expertise in multibody-based human modelling and motion generation by means of optimal control. The company fleXstructures is responsible for the development, maintenance and distribution of the software family IPS including the digital human model IPS IMMA. Up to now, human models have been used either in crash simulations to estimate the risk of injury or in ergonomics analyses. In crash analyses, detailed, computationally intensive FE models are used for calculations in the millisecond range, which are not suitable for the simulation of dynamic driving manoeuvres, since longer sequences have to be simulated here. In contrast, human models for ergonomics analysis are based on the simplified kinematics of a multibody model and so far only allow quasi-static investigations. Realistic postures and movements for new activities can only be modelled with great effort using these models. The prototypical human model EMMA developed at the ITWM, on the other hand, is capable of automatically calculating new postures and movement sequences with the corresponding muscle activities by means of an optimisation algorithm. The small number of degrees of freedom (<300) and the variable integration method used for time integration provide a very efficient model for a stable dynamic simulation with large time steps. EMMA4Drive enables a comparatively simple implementation of new movement patterns and an efficient virtual evaluation of safety, comfort and ergonomics in (semi-) autonomous driving.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants (Transfer Project)
• Application Partner: fleXstructures GmbH
• Cooperation Partner: Dr.-Ing. Joachim Linn