The standard procedure for safety-testing automobiles and other vehicles is the crash test in which the car is rammed into a brick wall. The driver and passengers are models of humans called crash test dummies that are fitted with sensors. The sensors provide data on acceleration, rapid deceleration on impact, force of impact, and other motions of each dummy's torso and limbs that can be related to potential injuries for real human occupants. Although this testing method is widely accepted, instrumented, analyzed, and standardized, it has several major flaws. The vehicle is sacrificed, of course, and, although the human counterparts can be reused, the process of getting them to respond with all the complications of human bodies has been long and imperfect.

Early testing of vehicles used cadavers, but this practice had serious drawbacks including a shortage of cadavers. Damage could be readily observed...