LONDON (Reuters) — A Japanese monitoring system can detect when people are too tired to work safely, even before they know it, a science magazine said.
The system analyzes voice patterns for signs of fatigue and could be used to identify pilots and air traffic controllers who need rest.
"Our system is able to detect tiredness in test subjects 10 to 20 minutes before the subjects themselves notice it," Kakuichi Shiomi, of the Electronic Navigation Research Institute near Tokyo, told New Scientist magazine.
The fatigue and drowsiness predictor looks for and compares changes in the voices of well-rested people and tired people.
"The changes are hard to spot by simply watching the voice waveform, so the ENRI team wrote software that converts a voice signal's fractal structure into a graphical pattern that magnifies subtle, small changes," according to the weekly magazine.
Preliminary tests have been promising, so the researchers plan to try out the system on pilots and air traffic controllers.
"Human error accounts for around 80 percent of all air accidents worldwide," the magazine said.
If the tests are successful, Shiomi thinks the system could be used in any transportation system where voice commands can be monitored.