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Volkswagen is starting up one of those 'centres of excellence' that companies periodically create for engines, electronics and, probably, pies we assume. This one's not about pies, though (sadly) but lights. Specifically, clever new lights that will be able to project images onto the road behind you, in what Volkswagen is calling "the virtual space."
The idea is (again, sadly) not to be able to use your car to project the new Avengers movie onto your driveway, but instead to project images, shapes, and information that will give the driver, and other drivers a better idea of what's happening, and thereby improve safety levels.
The new lights include micro-pixel HD headlights which use as many as 30,000 light-producing points, and HD LED lights as "low-cost alternative to cost-intensive laser light." These high-definition lights will be able to project information onto the road surface.
So, for example, when fitted to a Touareg, these new lights will be able to project a box onto the road ahead of the car, which shows the driver the vehicle's precise width, enabling them to better judge tight gaps such as narrow lanes and roadworks. The lights will be able to also take account of things like trailers, and they're clever enough to be able to follow the curves of corners.
Tail-lights will also play their part, and will be able to incorporate warnings for following traffic, such as the fact that you're the tail-end Charlie in a traffic jam. They'll also be able to project the car's shape and path onto the ground when reversing, giving pedestrians more details of where the car is going when, for example, reverse parking.
To make all of this possible, Volkswagen's centre of lighting excellence in its Wolfsburg factory already has a 100-metre long, 15-metre wide and 5-metre high light tunnel, which allows engineers to test and develop lighting systems round-the-clock. It's not only to test the systems themselves but also to see how other road users and pedestrians react to them.