SOUTHAMPTON researchers are working on an £11m project to create driverless cars.

A team from the University of Southampton will join academics from nine other UK universities on the project, which was announced today by Secretary of State for Business, Sajid Javid.

The Southampton team, working with the University of Cambridge, will lead research into how drivers will react to an automatic system and have created a driving simulator which uses a Jaguar XJ connected to computers.

Researchers will test it on drivers of different ages, gender, experience and capability in a range of scenarios, including adverse weather and different raod types.

They will then move on to driving the vehicle on a test track, recording the psychological state of drivers to see what changes are needed and whether the automated system can be more tailored to a driver.

Prof Neville Stanton from the University of Southampton, who is leading the HI:DAV project, says: “Highly automated vehicles are likely to be on public roads within the next ten years.

"The largest gap in our understanding of vehicle automation is how drivers will react to this new technology and how best to design the driver-automation interaction.

“This project will answer these questions by studying a wide range of drivers with different driving experience in simulators, or test-tracks and in road going vehicles.

"This approach aims to personalise the driver interfaces to the widest range of drivers possible so that the system adapts to the driver, rather than the driver having to adapt to the system.”

The project is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and Jaguar Land Rover.