DEARBORN, MI- Ford is beginning research into one of the world's first digital human child body models that could someday serve as a digital dummy for computer crash testing with a goal of enhancing research of future safety technologies.

"We study injury trends in the field, and we know that traffic crashes are the leading cause of death for people from age 1 to 34," says Steve Rouhana, senior technical leader for Safety, Ford Research and Advanced Engineering. "We want to better understand how injuries to younger occupants may be different."

The work is the next step in Ford's decade-long research to build a sophisticated and detailed computer adult human model, with body parts and organs painstakingly replicated so scientists could better understand what happens to the adult body in a crash.

"Our restraint systems are developed to help reduce serious injuries and fatalities in the field, and they have proven to be very effective," Rouhana said. "But crash injuries still occur. The more you know about the human body, the more we can consider how to make our restraint systems, even better.”