An experimental study of the impact of an obstacle on the escape efficiency by using mice under high competition

Lin, Ping; Ma, Jian; Liu, Tian Yang; Ran, Tong; Liang, Yijian; Wu, Fan; Wang, Guo Yuan

doi:10.1016/j.physa.2017.04.021

Cited by 54 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…Still, it should not be discarded that there exists a specific condition in which the obstacle might offer some benefit concerning the evacuation time, but this feature must not be taken as a generic hallmark of pedestrian dynamics in any case. Furthermore, our finding contrasts with previous data on the effect of the obstacle in animal flow through bottlenecks [31,13,32], exposing a clear instance of the dangers involving direct extrapolation of animal behaviour to humans.…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, the beneficial role of the obstacle in clogging prevention has been taken as a genuine feature of many-particle systems passing through constrictions. Notably, it has been experimentally proved for granular matter discharged from a silo [29,30], and the passage of different animals (such as sheep [13,31] and mice [32]) through narrow doors. Nevertheless, apart from some inconclusive results [3,[33][34][35], an experimental confirmation of this feature in real pedestrian tests is still lacking.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Redefining the role of obstacles in pedestrian evacuation

Garcimartín

Maza

Pastor³

et al. 2018

New J. Phys.

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The placement of obstacles in front of doors is believed to be an effective strategy to increase the flow of pedestrians, hence improving the evacuation process. Since it was first suggested, this counterintuitive feature is considered a hallmark of pedestrian flows through bottlenecks. Indeed, despite the little experimental evidence, the placement of an obstacle has been hailed as the panacea for solving evacuation problems. In this work, we challenge this idea and experimentally demonstrate that the pedestrians flow rate is not necessarily altered by the presence of an obstacle. This result-which is at odds with recent demonstrations on its suitability for the cases of granular media, sheep and micediffers from the outcomes of most of existing numerical models, and warns about the risks of carelessly extrapolating animal behaviour to humans. Our experimental findings also reveal an unnoticed phenomenon in relation with the crowd movement in front of the exit: in competitive evacuations, an obstacle attenuates the development of collective transversal rushes, which are hazardous as they might cause falls.

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Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Redefining the role of obstacles in pedestrian evacuation

Garcimartín

Maza

Pastor³

et al. 2018

New J. Phys.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Other reasonable obstacle settings that could help improve the evacuation efficiency have also been evaluated based on simulation [7,8]. This phenomenon tends to be more apparent in the case of silo [9], sheep [10] and mice [11] outflow without self-awareness or with high competition, while hard to be observed in non-emergency egress conditions [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experimental study on the evading behavior of individual pedestrians when confronting with an obstacle in a corridor

Jia

Feliciani

Yanagisawa

et al. 2019

Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications

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In this paper, controlled experiments have been conducted to make deep analysis on the obstacle evading behavior of individual pedestrians affected by one obstacle. Results of Fourier Transform show that with the increase of obstacle width, the frequency and amplitude of body sway would barely be affected while the lateral deviation of walking direction would largely increase. On the one hand, the relation among the extracted gait features including body sway, stride length, frequency and speed has been illustrated. On the other hand, the walking direction can be featured by three critical evading points where apparent change of walking direction could be observed. Gaussian function has been used to fit the walking direction, thus allowing to estimate the three critical points and examine their variation with the increase of obstacle size. Furthermore, the direct-indirect evading and left-right turning preference as well as the possible psychological motivations behind have been analyzed. It is indicated that direct-evading pedestrians have a higher walking efficiency and right-turning pedestrians have a stronger tendency to behave 'direct'. Results of this paper are expected to provide practical evidence for the modeling of pedestrian dynamics affected by obstacles.

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“…Another scenario in which resemblances among different multiparticle systems has been found is the placement of an obstacle in front of the exit [3,9,16,[22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31]. Indeed, it has been shown that in such diverse systems as inert grains, ants, mice, and sheep, the presence of the obstacle can improve the flow rate due to the prevention of clogging.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of obstacle position in the flow of sheep through a narrow door

et al. 2016

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In a recent work [Phys. Rev. E 91, 022808 (2015)] it was reported that placing an obstacle in front of a gate has a beneficial effect in the flow of sheep through it. Here, we extend such results by implementing three different obstacle positions. We have observed that the flow is improved in two cases, while it worsens in the other one; the last instance happens when the obstacle is too close to the door. In this situation, the outcomes suggest that clogging develops between the doorjamb and the obstacle, contrary to the cases when the obstacle is farther, in which case clogging always occurs at the very door. The effectiveness of the obstacle (a strategy put forward to alleviate clogging in emergency exits) is therefore quite sensitive to its location. In addition, the study of the temporal evolution of the flow rate as the test develops makes evident a steady behavior during the entire duration of the entrance. This result is at odds with recent findings in human evacuation tests where the flow rate varies over time, therefore challenging the fairness of straightforward comparisons between pedestrian behavior and animal experimental observations.

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An experimental study of the impact of an obstacle on the escape efficiency by using mice under high competition

Cited by 54 publications

References 19 publications

Redefining the role of obstacles in pedestrian evacuation

Redefining the role of obstacles in pedestrian evacuation

Experimental study on the evading behavior of individual pedestrians when confronting with an obstacle in a corridor

Effect of obstacle position in the flow of sheep through a narrow door

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