Monitoring
New system offers more accurate blood pressure measurements
Traditionally, blood pressure is measured using the familiar inflatable cuff and stethoscope on the upper arm. While this method has sufficed for over a century, some people maintain that it is inaccurate – blood pressure in the arm is reportedly higher than at the heart, and not by a consistent, easily compensated-for amount. Because high blood pressure can cause the most damage at the heart and in the nearby brain, it would make sense to monitor it at the heart, too. That's just what a new device designed at the University of Leicester does ... in a roundabout way. Read More
Scientists have used gelatinous hydrogel to create an inexpensive new type of biochemical sensor that is highly sensitive, sturdy, long-lasting, and has few moving parts. The gel expands or contracts according to the acidity of its environment, a quality that allows the sensor to measure changes in pH down to one one-thousandth on the pH scale. This amount of accuracy, along with its robustness, could make it ideal for chemical and biological applications such as environmental monitoring in waterways and glucose monitoring in blood. Read More
According to a 2008 study by the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, about 20 percent of all road traffic accidents are caused by driver fatigue. Tired motorists are also eight times more likely than rested motorists to get in an accident, displaying driving abilities similar to those of someone who is intoxicated. The problem is, we often don’t know when we’ve reached that “too tired” state – a situation that the Anti Sleep Pilot was created to address. The Danish-designed device sits on your dashboard, monitoring you and your driving conditions, and lets you know when it’s time to pull over and take a ten-minute rest. Read More
Wearable health monitors have been available for some time, providing feedback on functions such as heart rate and blood pressure. They represent the tip of a potentially huge health and fitness market, from athletes and emergency services personnel to patients both in and recently discharged from hospital, who could benefit from real-time, intelligent wireless body monitoring of vital signs. Telemetry technology provider Toumaz has developed an ultra-low power system to wirelessly monitor heart rate, ECG, temperature and physical activity. The Sensium Life Platform has just been used to monitor the health of team members during a record-breaking 4,000 kilometer transantarctic expedition that not only made the fastest vehicle crossing of the Antarctic, but was also the first expedition to use biofuels extensively in Antarctica, and featured the first bio-fuelled vehicle ever to reach the South Pole. Read More
Is it actually smoggy outside today, or is it just you? If you have the Visibility app on your Android smartphone, you can find out. Just take a picture of the sky, and you will receive a message detailing how polluted the air is at your location. Not only will you know if you should take shelter indoors, but you will also be contributing to the scientific understanding of local air pollution. Read More
New CCTV tech could spot abandoned baggage and track its owner
We’ve told you before about CCTV programs that can identify criminal behavior, or that skip through footage where nothing’s happening. Now, a consortium of ten organizations from six European countries is working on another concept involving video monitoring of public spaces. It’s called the SUBITO project, for Surveillance of Unattended Baggage and the Identification and Tracking of the Owner, and it’s intended to do pretty much what the name suggests. Installed in existing security camera systems at places such as airports or train stations, the software will identify baggage that has been left unattended, and that could therefore possibly contain an explosive device. It will then search back to identify the person who deposited that baggage, then follow them forward through various cameras to establish their present location. Read More
Seems not even babies are safe from the advances in wearable technology. Nowadays, unborn children can tweet or listen to music and fully-fledged infants can wear a suit that changes color when they have a fever. The latest wearable concept is the Exmobaby sleep suit – a baby garment designed to monitor a baby’s heart rate, emotional state and activity level and to wirelessly relay the information to a cell phone or PC. Read More
When rest is important to a patient, being rigged up to a heart monitor or disrupted whilst they sleep and having a cold stethoscope placed on their chest isn’t ideal. To get around this problem, a team of scientists at the University of Sussex, UK have successfully developed sensors that are able to detect a heartbeat up to a meter away. The Electric Potential Sensors (EPS) are the world’s first electrical sensors able to monitor heartbeats accurately whilst patients relax in their bed, or rest at home. This breakthrough device gives medical teams and health workers the chance to administer patient-friendly monitoring with minimum impact on mobility or personal space. Read More
Hoping to capitalize on over-protective pet owners (like myself!), Softbank is rolling out its innovative – and admittedly cute – Mimamori Camera. This clever pet monitoring system allows you to keep tabs on your pet remotely via your mobile phone, all in real time using a Japanese handset's 'TV call' function. Read More
The evolution of the humble surfcam will see a major milestone this weekend when Australian surfcam network Coastalwatch begins rolling out its new realtime Wave Height/Wave Period technology. The Coastalwatch software analyzes live video segments from its cameras to track wave movement through the break zone providing actual wave height and wave period. This means that eventually, Coastalwatch’s 100+ camera network of web-accessible surf cams will be continuously updating its surf reports throughout the day, overcoming the current global phenomena of a surf reporter filing a report at 7.00am listing the surf size as 2ft, yet by 11.00am it may have built to 4 – 5 ft. Read More
