SAN ANTONIO – Dr. Yufang Jin’s lab can get pretty loud, and that’s because she’s turned to technology to solve an age-old problem.
“Road rage is very severe,” Jin, a professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio, said. “We believe that the youth will be the future of our society.”
Jin works with the Community Alliance of Traffic Safety (CATS) to find solutions to aggressive driving. CATS reports that road rage in San Antonio is seeing an upward trend.
“People are angry, and people are frustrated,” Dean DeSoto, the executive director of CATS, said. “We can hopefully stop the trend.”
This team is looking to educate the next generation on good driving habits. Jin is spearheading multiple programs to promote these efforts.
She leads a team of high schoolers called the Technowizards. The Technowizards are competing in national robotics competitions.
Right now, they’re using artificial intelligence to make self-driving cars. She said that could minimize speeding and tailgating.
Across Jin’s lab, some of her undergraduate students are designing a driving simulation that plays like a video game.
But its mission has a real-world impact: The better you drive, the higher your score.
UTSA senior Omar Alsamman, who is helping design the simulation, explains some of its benefits.
“Practicing traffic lights, driving rules, and stop signs,” Alsamman said, in part.
The programs are still in the early stages, but researchers see this as the next step to hopefully changing driving habits in Texas. All with the help of technology.