Biosignal‐based human–machine interfaces for assistance and rehabilitation : a survey

As a definition, Human–Machine Interface (HMI) enables a person to interact with a device. Starting from elementary equipment, the recent development of novel techniques and unobtrusive devices for biosignals monitoring paved the way for a new class of HMIs, which take such biosignals as inputs to control various applications. The current survey aims to review the large literature of the last two decades regarding biosignal‐based HMIs for assistance and rehabilitation to outline state‐of‐the‐art and identify emerging technologies and potential future research trends. PubMed and other databases were surveyed by using specific keywords. The found studies were further screened in three levels (title, abstract, full‐text), and eventually, 144 journal papers and 37 conference papers were included. Four macrocategories were considered to classify the different biosignals used for HMI control: biopotential, muscle mechanical motion, body motion, and their combinations (hybrid systems). The HMIs were also classified according to their target application by considering six categories: prosthetic control, robotic control, virtual reality control, gesture recognition, communication, and smart environment control. An ever‐growing number of publications has been observed over the last years. Most of the studies (about 67%) pertain to the assistive field, while 20% relate to rehabilitation and 13% to assistance and rehabilitation. A moderate increase can be observed in studies focusing on robotic control, prosthetic control, and gesture recognition in the last decade. In contrast, studies on the other targets experienced only a small increase. Biopotentials are no longer the leading control signals, and the use of muscle mechanical motion signals has experienced a considerable rise, especially in prosthetic control. Hybrid technologies are promising, as they could lead to higher performances. However, they also increase HMIs’ complex-ity, so their usefulness should be carefully evaluated for the specific application

Electro-oculography in the Field of Assistive Interaction Communication

There is sufficient evidence about feasible use of electrical bio signals in the field of Alternate Communication. Additionally, they are particularly suitable in the case of people with severe motor disorder, for example people with other physical disorder. Developing solutions for them involves different ways of using sensors that decides the user’s needs and limitations, which in turn converts the user’s intentions into commands. The system should be evaluated with an appropriate method. This paper submits alternative communication techniques used for communication using electrooculography technique. DOI: 10.17762/ijritcc2321-8169.15035

Novel Approch of Man Machine Interaction using Brain Waves Electric Signals

No Abstrac

Overcoming barriers and increasing independence: service robots for elderly and disabled people

This paper discusses the potential for service robots to overcome barriers and increase independence of elderly and disabled people. It includes a brief overview of the existing uses of service robots by disabled and elderly people and advances in technology which will make new uses possible and provides suggestions for some of these new applications. The paper also considers the design and other conditions to be met for user acceptance. It also discusses the complementarity of assistive service robots and personal assistance and considers the types of applications and users for which service robots are and are not suitable

Cognitive assisted living ambient system: a survey

The demographic change towards an aging population is creating a significant impact and introducing drastic challenges to our society. We therefore need to find ways to assist older people to stay independently and prevent social isolation of these population. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) provide various solutions to help older adults to improve their quality of life, stay healthier, and live independently for a time. Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) is a field to investigate innovative technologies to provide assistance as well as healthcare and rehabilitation to impaired seniors. The paper provides a review of research background and technologies of AAL

Autonomous wheelchair with a smart driving mode and a Wi-Fi positioning system

Wheelchairs are an important aid that enhances the mobility of people with several types of disabilities. Therefore, there has been considerable research and development on wheelchairs to meet the needs of the disabled. Since the early manual wheelchairs to their more recent electric powered counterparts, advancements have focused on improving autonomy in mobility. Other developments, such as Internet advancements, have developed the concept of the Internet of Things (IoT). This is a promising area that has been studied to enhance the independent operation of the electrical wheelchairs by enabling autonomous navigation and obstacle avoidance. This dissertation describes shortly the design of an autonomous wheelchair of the IPL/IT (Instituto Politécnico de Leiria/Instituto de Telecomunicações) with smart driving features for persons with visual impairments. The objective is to improve the prototype of an intelligent wheelchair. The first prototype of the wheelchair was built to control it by voice, ocular movements, and GPS (Global Positioning System). Furthermore, the IPL/IT wheelchair acquired a remote control feature which could prove useful for persons with low levels of visual impairment. This tele-assistance mode will be helpful to the family of the wheelchair user or, simply, to a health care assistant. Indoor and outdoor positioning systems, with printed directional Wi-Fi antennas, have been deployed to enable a precise location of our wheelchair. The underlying framework for the wheelchair system is the IPL/IT low cost autonomous wheelchair prototype that is based on IoT technology for improved affordability

A Human-Machine Interface Based on Eye Tracking for Controlling and Monitoring a Smart Home Using the Internet of Things

Não consta

Cadeira de rodas eléctrica adaptada a tetraplégicos

Mestrado em Engenharia Electrónica e TelecomunicaçõesA mobilidade e a independências são dois requisitos fundamentais para uma boa qualidade de vida. Existe, no entanto um determinado numero de pessoas que por terem sofrido lesões graves ao nível da coluna cervical, perderam capacidades físicas que afectaram estes dois requisitos. Estas pessoas são denominadas de tetraplégicas e necessitam de uma cadeira de rodas para se conseguirem mover. Na maioria dos casos não conseguem manipular a cadeira de rodas manual, desta forma, necessitam de uma cadeira de rodas eléctrica comercial onde o _único interface entre a cadeira e o utilizador _e o joystick . Isto pressupõe que o utilizador tenha de possuir destreza para o operar, o que nem sempre acontece. Esta dissertação discute e implementa a introdução de mecanismo para adaptar uma cadeira de rodas eléctrica comercial, com o intuito de facilitar a sua manipulação por parte de pessoas tetraplégicas com for cá reduzida nos braços e mãos. Pretende-se assim adaptar uma cadeira de rodas eléctrica comercial de forma a que a interacção entre o utilizador e a cadeira seja apenas a necessária. Desta forma, será implementado um novo modelo de adaptação da cadeira, o modo Legacy Adapted Mode (LAM). Pretende-se também que o custo de implementação do novo modelo seja relativamente baixo, de forma a que a cadeira seja acessível do ponto de vista económico. O modo LAM permite que o utilizador comande a cadeira com uma reduzida interacção com o joystick, ou seja, o utilizador não necessita de manter o joystick deflectido para a movimentar, basta apenas dar um impulso ao joystick e a cadeira inicia o movimento. A cadeira de rodas que servirá de base á implementação _e uma cadeira de rodas eléctrica comercial que possui dois módulos em comunicação, (o módulo do joystick e o módulo de potência) que comunicam entre si através de uma rede de comunicação baseada em CAN. Com base na arquitectura existente, pretende-se incorporar na rede um novo módulo de intercepção do barramento. Este módulo irá efectuar a captura das mensagens para manipulação do seu campo de dados, de acordo com as especificações do modo LAM, e as retransmitirá posteriormente para o módulo de destino, bridging das mensagens. Foram implementados dois modos de bridging das mensagens, Event Trig- gered e o Time Triggered, no entanto apenas o Time Triggered cumpre os timings na sequ^encia das mensagens. O modo LAM foi implementado e foram efectuados alguns testes relativamente ao controlo da cadeira, entre os quais a condição de início de movimento, a condição de paragem e a condição de rotação da cadeira.Mobility and independence are two fundamental requirements for a good quality of life. There is however a number of people who have su ered serious injuries at the cervical spine, resulting in loss of physical abilities which a ected these two requirements. These are paraplegic people and they rely on a wheelchair for movement. In most cases they aren t able to handle a manual wheelchair, so they need a commercial electric wheelchair where the only interface between the chair and the user is the joystick. However this implies that the user has enough dexterity to properly operate it, which does not always happen. This thesis discusses and implements the introduction of mechanisms to adapt a commercial powered wheelchair in order to ease its manipulation by paraplegic people with reduced strength in arms and hands. The main goal is to adapt the chair so that the interaction between the user and the chair requires the least e ort possible. Thus a new adjusting model will be implemented to the chair, the Legacy Adapted Mode (LAM). However this implementation must come with the lowest cost possible to maintain an economically a ordable chair. LAM mode allows the user to command the chair with a reduced interaction with the joystick, ie the user does not need to keep the joystick de ected, a single boost to the joystick and the chair starts moving. The wheelchair used as basis for the implementation of the proposed work has two commercial modules (joystick and power module) which communicate through a communication network based on the CAN protocol. Based on the existing architecture, a new module will be incorporated on the network bus. This module will capture messages, manipulate their data eld according to the LAM speci cations and retransmit them to the destination module. Event and Time Triggered based bridging protocols were implemented, however only the latter meets the message timing requirements. LAM mode has been implemented and some control tests were conducted on the chair, including the start of movement, stop condition and chair rotation

Development of a simulation tool for measurements and analysis of simulated and real data to identify ADLs and behavioral trends through statistics techniques and ML algorithms

openCon una popolazione di anziani in crescita, il numero di soggetti a rischio di patologia è in rapido aumento. Molti gruppi di ricerca stanno studiando soluzioni pervasive per monitorare continuamente e discretamente i soggetti fragili nelle loro case, riducendo i costi sanitari e supportando la diagnosi medica. Comportamenti anomali durante l'esecuzione di attività di vita quotidiana (ADL) o variazioni sulle tendenze comportamentali sono di grande importanza.With a growing population of elderly people, the number of subjects at risk of pathology is rapidly increasing. Many research groups are studying pervasive solutions to continuously and unobtrusively monitor fragile subjects in their homes, reducing health-care costs and supporting the medical diagnosis. Anomalous behaviors while performing activities of daily living (ADLs) or variations on behavioral trends are of great importance. To measure ADLs a significant number of parameters need to be considering affecting the measurement such as sensors and environment characteristics or sensors disposition. To face the impossibility to study in the real context the best configuration of sensors able to minimize costs and maximize accuracy, simulation tools are being developed as powerful means. This thesis presents several contributions on this topic. In the following research work, a study of a measurement chain aimed to measure ADLs and represented by PIRs sensors and ML algorithm is conducted and a simulation tool in form of Web Application has been developed to generate datasets and to simulate how the measurement chain reacts varying the configuration of the sensors. Starting from eWare project results, the simulation tool has been thought to provide support for technicians, developers and installers being able to speed up analysis and monitoring times, to allow rapid identification of changes in behavioral trends, to guarantee system performance monitoring and to study the best configuration of the sensors network for a given environment. The UNIVPM Home Care Web App offers the chance to create ad hoc datasets related to ADLs and to conduct analysis thanks to statistical algorithms applied on data. To measure ADLs, machine learning algorithms have been implemented in the tool. Five different tasks have been identified. To test the validity of the developed instrument six case studies divided into two categories have been considered. To the first category belong those studies related to: 1) discover the best configuration of the sensors keeping environmental characteristics and user behavior as constants; 2) define the most performant ML algorithms. The second category aims to proof the stability of the algorithm implemented and its collapse condition by varying user habits. Noise perturbation on data has been applied to all case studies. Results show the validity of the generated datasets. By maximizing the sensors network is it possible to minimize the ML error to 0.8%. Due to cost is a key factor in this scenario, the fourth case studied considered has shown that minimizing the configuration of the sensors it is possible to reduce drastically the cost with a more than reasonable value for the ML error around 11.8%. Results in ADLs measurement can be considered more than satisfactory.INGEGNERIA INDUSTRIALEopenPirozzi, Michel