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In this paper, a system for time-frequency analysis of heart rate variability (HRV) using windowed Lomb periodogram is proposed. The system is designed with considerations in SOC implementation for portable applications. Time-frequency analysis of HRV is achieved through a de-normalized Lomb periodogram with a sliding window configuration. The Lomb time-frequency distribution (TFD) is suited for power spectral density (PSD) analysis of unevenly spaced data and has been applied to the analysis of heart rate variability. The system has been implemented in hardware as an HRV processor and verified on FPGA. Artificial heart rate was used to evaluate the system as well as data from the MIT-BIH arrhythmia database and real EKG data. Simulations show that the proposed Lomb TFD is able to achieve better frequency resolution than short-time Fourier transform of the same hardware size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A portable brain-heart monitoring system is proposed to integrate and miniaturize those heavy equipments in the hospitals. The system comprises a 4-channel independent component analysis (ICA) engine for artifact removal from EEG, a heart-rate variability (HRV) analysis engine for on-line HRV analysis and a diffuse optical tomography (DOT) engine for reconstruction of the absorption coefficient image of the brain tissue. A lossless compression module achieves 2.5 compression ratio is also employed to reduce the power consumption of the wireless transmission. EEG, EKG and near-infrared signals acquired from the analog front-end IC are processed in real-time or bypassed according to user configurations. Processed data and raw data are compressed and sent to a remote science station by a commercial Bluetooth module for further analysis and 3-D visualization and remote diagnosis. The ICA and HRV engine are verified by real EEG and EKG signals while the DOT engine is verified by an experimental model. The system is implemented using UMC 65nm CMOS technology, and the core size is 680x680 um2, and the estimated power consumption of the chip working at 24 MHz under full mode is 3.6 mW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the rapid development of diffuse optical tomography (DOT) technology has made possible many successful applications in the field of biomedicine, such as breast cancer detection and observation of oxygenated hemoglobin distribution in the brain. In this work, we build an inexpensive and portable real-time continuous wave near-infrared (CW-NIR) DOT system hardware suitable for use in system on a chip (SOC) applications. With greatly reduced system volume, the system can pave the way for practical develop- ments in the clinical setting. The proposed system processes digitized biomedical signals acquired from a front-end sensor circuit, and can operate in either continuous or discontinuous mode according to user settings. Finally, we demonstrate the improvements in image reconstruction associated with the two-dimensional (2D) post-processing technique employed in the proposed system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The immersive Earth Theater at Carnegie Museum of Natural History (CMNH) uses CaveUT and the Unreal Engine for real time virtual tours as part of public and educational programming. Research conducted comparing the theater with desktop displays shows immersion is a powerful tool, helping people create more connections. Content builds on the museum΄s strengths and includes dinosaurs, an Egyptian temple and a Seneca village. CMNH has tremendous expertise in traditional tours, combining skills of storytelling, communication, leading group dynamics, timing and humor to convey and contextualize the topics. This background is just as critical to great virtual tours as the beautiful, complex and natural graphics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to develop nonintrusive type ECG monitoring system based on active electrode with conductive fabric. Our developed electrode can measure ECG signal without the electrolyte gel or the adhesives causing skin trouble. For the stable measurement of ECG signal, the buffer amplifier with high input impedance and the noise bypassing shield with conductive fabric were developed. This system involves real-time ECG signal monitoring, and wireless communication using the Zigbee protocol. We show experimental results for developing wearable ECG monitoring system and demonstrate how it can be applied to the design of nonintrusive electrode with conductive fabric. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new measuring instrument for 10 points soil temperatures in 0-50 centimeters depth underground was designed. System was based on Silicon Laboratories΄ MCU C8051F310, single chip digital temperature sensor DS18B20, and other peripheral circuits. It was simultaneously able to measure, memory and display, and also convey data to computer via a standard RS232 interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]