AUG Signals Radar System detects and monitors large mammals and alerts drivers

IN THE wilds of Canada and Skandanavia, thousands of motorists have serious life-threatening collisions involving moose and large mammals.

Collisions with large mammals weighing in at 1,000 Kg will cause serious damage to vehicles and inevitable human fatalities.

A new roadside radar system could prevent collisions by detecting and keeping track of large animals, whilst at the same time, warning drivers when it would be wise to slow down and be alert to potential collisions.

Abir Mukherjee of AUG Signals in Toronto says existing set-ups, which use light beam tripwires, are not reliable.

"With a tripwire system, when an animal crosses it into the road, it will alert," he says. "But after a fixed time, the system goes off. Then the system doesn't know where the animal is."

The Large Animal Detection System (LADS) sends out a 360-degree radar signal every second, then monitors the reflections to work out what animals are there. Its software allows it to ignore small animals and vegetation in the radar's path.



The detector has been running as a pilot project on Canada's Highway 416 near Kemptville, Ontario, since last year. LADS has an effective radius of 700 metres and works in harsh weather and heavy snow.

When it detects an animal, lights flash on street signs to alert drivers. It also records data on the number and speed of vehicles.

Mukherjee will present a paper on LADS at the IEEE Sensors conference in Baltimore, Maryland, in November.

Cabriolet & Convertibles - Men Drivers at Risk of Hearing Loss

A study of more than 5,000 people in the United States aged 20 to 69 found that males were three times as likely to have noise-related hearing loss as women. The research was recently presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Otolaryngology -- Head and Neck Surgery in San Diego, California.
Occupational and recreational noise exposure, as well as service in the armed forces, are likely explanations for why men are at greater risk, said Dr. Hamid Djalilian of the University of California, Irvine, Medical Center, who collaborated on the research.

While the study did not focus on specific root causes, anecdotally Djalilian sees patients whose hearing problems most likely stem from music at concerts or night clubs, or outdoor activities with "powered instrumentation" such as chain saws and motorcycles. Listen to sounds at different levels »

Dr. Douglas Mattox, professor of otolaryngology at Emory University School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study, agreed. People who regularly use leaf-blowers, lawnmowers and other noisy machinery are at increased risk of noise-induced hearing loss, he said. Activities such as hunting and motorcycle-riding, which men typically do more than women, also create high levels of noise that may impair hearing.