Wearable and Nearable Biosensors and Systems for Healthcare

Biosensors and systems in the form of wearables and “nearables” (i.e., everyday sensorized objects with transmitting capabilities such as smartphones) are rapidly evolving for use in healthcare. Unlike conventional approaches, these technologies can enable seamless or on-demand physiological monitoring, anytime and anywhere. Such monitoring can help transform healthcare from the current reactive, one-size-fits-all, hospital-centered approach into a future proactive, personalized, decentralized structure. Wearable and nearable biosensors and systems have been made possible through integrated innovations in sensor design, electronics, data transmission, power management, and signal processing. Although much progress has been made in this field, many open challenges for the scientific community remain, especially for those applications requiring high accuracy. This book contains the 12 papers that constituted a recent Special Issue of Sensors sharing the same title. The aim of the initiative was to provide a collection of state-of-the-art investigations on wearables and nearables, in order to stimulate technological advances and the use of the technology to benefit healthcare. The topics covered by the book offer both depth and breadth pertaining to wearable and nearable technology. They include new biosensors and data transmission techniques, studies on accelerometers, signal processing, and cardiovascular monitoring, clinical applications, and validation of commercial devices

Biomedical Engineering

Biomedical engineering is currently relatively wide scientific area which has been constantly bringing innovations with an objective to support and improve all areas of medicine such as therapy, diagnostics and rehabilitation. It holds a strong position also in natural and biological sciences. In the terms of application, biomedical engineering is present at almost all technical universities where some of them are targeted for the research and development in this area. The presented book brings chosen outputs and results of research and development tasks, often supported by important world or European framework programs or grant agencies. The knowledge and findings from the area of biomaterials, bioelectronics, bioinformatics, biomedical devices and tools or computer support in the processes of diagnostics and therapy are defined in a way that they bring both basic information to a reader and also specific outputs with a possible further use in research and development