There's nothing worse than motion sickness on a long, winding, pothole-filled drive.
And for one in three people who are particularly prone to motion sickness, the inevitable nausea can be an almost daily discomfort.
But now a company says it has the solution to combating motion sickness – and could even help with the harrowing experience of driving over pothole-ridden terrain.
ClearMotion – a Massachusetts-based startup with offices in Birmingham, UK and Shanghai, China – just announced a $1 billion deal to create a futuristic chassis that claims to cancel unwanted car movements.
By adapting the vehicle to the road, this high-tech suspension ensures that a car can actively compensate for irregularities in the road surface.
One in three people suffer from motion sickness and for those most affected it can be a daily inconvenience (stock image)
Massachusetts-based startup ClearMotion claims to have made motion sickness a thing of the past with its high-tech suspension systems
Inspired by drives through the pothole-filled roads of Massachusetts, the team behind ClearVision realized that the way cars currently work was not fit for the future.
As more cars become self-driving, we hope that one day we will have much more time to read, write, or do whatever we want on the go.
Estimates from McKinsey & Company suggest that as many as a third of cars will have some form of automation by 2030.
But anyone who's ever tried to read while sitting in the back of a car knows how much worse motion sickness gets.
Although the causes of motion sickness are complex, part of the reason we get sick while driving is the repetitive small movements caused by the car rolling over bumps.
These bumps cause your eyes and inner ears to send different signals to the inner ear, making you feel sick.
What ClearVision hopes is that by turning off the motion of the car, they can reduce motion sickness, even for people who may be working in the car.
Zackary Anderson, CTO and co-founder of ClearMotion, told MailOnline: 'As we move closer to a future where we have to roll up our sleeves, the time we spend driving can now be used to work, rest and watch a movie in the car. children – everything you need on the way to your next destination, without motion sickness and a much smoother ride.'
ClearMotion says its technology aims to help people relax or be productive in cars, without feeling sick from looking at screens
To reduce motion sickness, ClearMotion replaces traditional shock absorbers with small, fast-acting actuators that drive the wheels up and down
Traditional suspension systems use loaded springs in the car's chassis to absorb some of the impact of uneven road surfaces.
But to get an even smoother driving experience, ClearMotion has had to update this technology for the 21st century.
Instead of springs, the car is equipped with a small, fast-acting motor linked to a pump mechanism.
The wheels are pushed and pulled by these motors to overcome bumps in the road, allowing the car to drive smoothly over obstacles.
But what makes this really unique is that ClearMotion's technology actively responds to the road surface as the car moves.
Mr. Anderson explains that the motors “move the steering wheel up and down at very high speeds to sense what the road is doing, then suppress any movement before it even touches the body of the car.”
The system works like active noise cancellation in a nice pair of headphones: the suspension detects disturbances from the environment and actively responds to neutralize them.
While it won't eliminate motion completely, Anderson says it will “significantly attenuate unpleasant motion, while still providing some feedback to the driver.”
The suspension works like noise-canceling headphones by measuring the incoming disturbances and actively canceling them out
Each actuator contains a powerful motor that senses what the road is doing and cancels that movement before it reaches the car's body
Mr. Anderson explains that ClearMotion achieves this effect in two ways.
One solution relies on the suspension collecting data from the car's sensors to build a picture of the approaching road surface.
For example, when you approach a pothole, the suspension automatically detects the hole and extends the wheel, keeping the car and passengers level.
Second, ClearMotion uses crowdsourced road surface data to “help cars make the right decision at the right time.”
The company's software generates an accurate map of the road surface, which is combined with precise location data to predict how the car should react before it has to.
According to ClearMotion, this results in approximately 75 percent vibration in the driver's seat on a standard road compared to the best benchmark cars on the road.
Mr Anderson also told MailOnline that consumers who have tested the car report feeling less carsick during the journey.
However, there have been some high-profile setbacks in the dream of roads full of self-driving cars.
Based on measurements from the driver's seat, ClearMotion says their technology has reduced vibration by 75%
The dreams of autonomous vehicle advocates were dashed when California banned all self-driving cars and initiated the recall of all cruise vehicles in the state.
The king recently unveiled plans for an “autonomous vehicle bill” that would ease restrictions on autonomous buses and trucks.
Yet the same laws were criticized for delaying the adoption of self-driving cars and Tesla faced an effective ban on the sale of new 'self-driving' systems in Britain.
This came after Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors, was forced to recall all its self-driving cars when California banned the vehicles.
This move was furthered by a horrific accident in which a pedestrian was dragged six meters by an autonomous car.
Still, these obstacles haven't caused undue concern at ClearMotion, which has expanded to provide suspension for new electric vehicles.
Up to 2022, the company had raised a total of around $280 million (£221 million), and in 2023 it raised a further $35 million (£27.6 million).
To round out the year, the company has now announced that three million units of ClearMotion1, its flagship suspension product, will go into the ET9, NIO's latest electric car.
Mr Anderson says the company expects its technology to become more widely available in the future, likening it to innovation in aviation.
He added: 'When the first pressurized aircraft was introduced, it transformed the air travel experience and unleashed a new era of passenger air travel for consumers.
'People were now flying above the weather with a comfortable, enjoyable and enjoyable flying experience and air travel became much more mainstream.
“We want the experience behind the wheel to be enjoyable and productive, just like air travel. One where you can watch a movie or work while you're in the cabin.”