Tag Archives: Patent

How Wrist Pedometers Count Steps

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Patent title: Adaptive Step Detection

Patent number: US 20130191069A1

Patent filing date: 01/18/2013

Patent issue date: 07/25/2013

Time it took for the patent to be issued: Just over 6 months

Inventor: Sourabh Ravindran

Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated

U.S. classification: G01C22/006 Pedometers

Number of claims: 7

 

Today, there are many different types of pedometers that are used by athletes and non-athletes alike. Brands such as Garmin, Fitbit, and Apple make smart watches that allow users to track their steps, distance covered, and floors climbed all while reading text messages and playing music. However, before these complex devices, people still used pedometers to track their steps. Traditional pedometers were worn on clipped to the waist and tracked steps based on the movement of the hips. This patent was filed by Texas Instruments Incorporated for a pedometer that would be worn on the wrist instead of the hip. Devices like this helped pave the way for the popular smart watches worn today. 

The main claim of this pedometer is that it can be worn on the wrist and can track steps as accurately as traditional pedometers worn on the hip (figure 1). The another main claim of this device is that it uses three accelerometers to track step data to account for sway and extraneous movements of the arm during daily life. The device also has the capacity to store data, which can be exported to other devices, such as a computer via USB or Bluetooth. In addition, the device has a screen to display step count or distance traveled. 

Figure 1. The design drawing of the wrist pedometer (600). 514 indicates the screen that will display the users step count, the distance traveled, or the time. 516 indicates a button that can be used to select what is displayed on the screen.

Traditional pedometers were worn on the belt and steps were detected based on the motion of the hips. Movement at the wrist is more complex and can result in more false steps than pedometers worn on the hip. The algorithm used to determine what is registered as a step was altered to account for this more complex motion. To do this, a three axis accelerometer was used to make motion detectable regardless of how the arm was oriented. Data from each axis is filtered and combined by summing the absolute value of each sample. The result is one graph that represents all of the acceleration data in order to get a more accurate depiction of when steps were taken (figure 2).

 

Figure 2. The graph of the combined waveform data from each of the three (x, y, and z) accelerometers. 322 and 323 indicate regions around inflection points, 330 points out a region where the amplitude of the slope exceeds the allowable threshold, 331 indicates the time duration of the positive slope region, and 333 indicates where the time threshold was exceeded for an inflection point region. When each threshold value is met, a step is registered for that particular sloping region.

 Using this plot, an adaptive peak detector is utilized in the hardware to quantify the acceleration of each movement. This detector identifies inflection points in the acceleration data collected to identify positive and negative slopes in the accelerations. If the slope regions reach or surpass a threshold value and last for a specified time threshold, then the device registers this as a step. The time restraint helps separate noise from actual step data. The detector then repeats this to track steps over time. Step frequency and the height of the user are determined in order to estimate stride length so that distance covered can also be output to the user. A study conducted showed that this device on the wrist is just as accurate as an older pedometer that was worn on the hip. 

Though the mechanisms used to count steps seem rather complex, this device could be used by anyone looking to track their daily steps. This device does not require any difficult training to use so learning how to use the device should not be a limiting factor for this device. Pedometers are used by people of all athletic abilities. If someone wants to begin exercising, this device could be used to track the number of steps accumulated during the day or during a particular workout. An avid runner could use this device to track the distance covered during a run based on stride length and step count. Therefore, this device can be widely used and may be of benefit to anyone trying to increase their physical fitness. Current wrist pedometers have exceeded the functions of this device, incorporating heart rate monitors, swim tracking, GPS tracking, and other technologies. The patent described some of these functions as potential future adaptations/embodiment of this device.

 

Reference:

Ravindran, S. (2013). US Patent No. US 2013/0191069A1. Retrieved from https://patents.google.com/patent/US20130191069?oq=intitle%3Aadaptive+intitle%3Astep+intitle%3Adetection

How Garmin Watch Heart Rate Monitors Work

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Using a GPS watch has become the norm in distance running. These watches provide users with information regarding distance traveled, pace, and even maps of the route taken. Newer watches also include heart rate monitors, providing users with greater information about their fitness. The popular watch brand, Garmin, has a patented heart rate monitor [1] used in their watches, seen in Figure 1 below. 

Figure 1. Back of Garmin watch with heart rate monitor device (labeled “610”) [1].

The heart rate monitor in Garmin watches monitors cardiac signals via the user’s wrist. The main claims of this invention are as follows:

  • The device consists of an emitter, receiver, inertial sensor, and time-variant sensor. The processor determines frequency associated with the motion signal, transforms the signal from PPG into the frequency domain, identifies the cardiac component of the PPG signal, configures a time-variant filter, and calculates the time between cardiac component cycles.
  • The device emits a light signal and receives an input of the light’s reflection, which eventually allows for the isolation of the cardiac component of signal.
  • The cardiac component of signal allows for heart rate to be determined.
  • The time between successive cycles gives insight into heart rate variability, stress, recovery time, VO2 max, and/or sleep quality.
  • The device contains an interface that displays determined information to the user.

This device would be of interest to any Garmin watch user, especially those interested in heart rate during exercise. This watch, primarily used by runners, tells the user their heart rate and therefore how fast their heart is pumping blood through the body at any given time during exercise. This gives insight into the user’s fitness and exertion levels and ensures the user is in desired heart rate zones while training. Knowing how heart rate changes personally affect the user can also give insight into dehydration, stress, and needed recovery. Using this device over an extended period of time allows for users to see improvements in heart rate due to exercise.

How Does it Work?

The heart rate monitor in Garmin watches directs light from a light-emitting diode (LED) to the skin of the user. The reflection of the light is received by a photodiode, which sends a light intensity signal to the processor. The processor generates a photoplethysmogram (PPG) signal – containing cardiac, motion (determined by an inertial sensor, which senses movement of the device), and respiratory components – based on the intensity of the reflected light.

To isolate the cardiac component of the PPG signal, time-variant filters are used to remove non-cardiac components. The PPG signal can initially be filtered with a bandpass filter that only passes signals within the range of possible cardiac component frequencies. This bandwidth can be adjusted by the processor to account for lesser or greater expected cardiac frequencies based on changes in the environment. For example, if the user begins running, the processor senses rapid motion change and the bandwidth will increase since heart rate is expected to rise.

To determine which other signals to remove within the passband, the processor first identifies one or more frequencies associated with the motion signal via the inertial sensor. The processor then transforms the PPG signal into the frequency domain. Comparing the identified motion signal frequencies with the transformed PPG signal allows for the cardiac component of the signal to be determined within the frequency domain. Then, based on the identified cardiac component, the processor is able to determine filter coefficients for the cardiac component which are configured into the time-variant filter. When the PPG signal is transformed back into the time domain and filtered through this time-variant filter, the motion component is removed from the PPG signal. This results in a time domain PPG signal without the motion component, making it easier to identify the cardiac component of the PPG signal in the time domain. See Figure 2 below for a flowchart describing this filtering process.

Figure 2. Flowchart describing the process of isolating heart rate from PPG signal [1].

The processor does not need to identify frequencies of the motion signal for every time point. It identifies these frequencies within the PPG signal for an initial time period, configures a filter to remove these frequencies, then uses the same filter to filter the motion signal from subsequent time periods of the PPG signal.

The device is also capable of storing memory. This allows for the device to create a model of expected cardiac component frequencies from previously determined data. Based on the model, the processor can then determine the probability of any given frequency within the PPG signal to be a frequency of the cardiac component.

Heartbeat and respiratory patterns are cyclical over a short period of time while motion data and noise can be cyclical or irregular for any length of time. Over a longer period of time, cardiac and respiratory signals can potentially have non-cyclical patterns (e.g. increasing heart rate during an exercise session). This allows for the variability in cardiac parameters to be determined. Analyzing variability in heart rate allows for estimates of parameters of stress, recovery time, VO2 max, and sleep quality.

 

This patent cites numerous references of inventions this device incorporates or improves upon. This device improves on a previous wrist-watch heart rate monitor (patent 2009/0048526), which was developed as an alternative to wearing a chest strap heart rate monitor. The Garmin device is different from this wrist-watch as this device does not include any inertial sensors. Therefore the Garmin device is able to better remove noise from motion [2]. Another exercise device by Samsung Electronics (patent US 7,867,142 B2) uses heart rate data to inform users about changes in their exercise speed by playing a sound. While the Garmin device does not play a sound, it uses the heart rate data to extrapolate information about stress, recovery time, VO2max, and sleep quality, which is likely to be of greater value to the user [3].

The following lists basic information regarding the Garmin heart rate monitor patent:

  1. Patent title: Heart Rate Monitor With Time Varying Linear Filtering
  2. Patent number: US 9,801,587 B2
  3. Patent filing date: Oct. 18, 2016
  4. Patent issue date: Oct. 31, 2017
  5. How long it took for this patent to issue: 1 year, 13 days
  6. Inventors: Paul R. MacDonald, Christopher J. Kulach
  7. Assignee: Garmin Switzerland GmbH
  8. U.S. classification: CPC: A61B 5/02416 (20130101); A61B 5/1112 (20130101); A61B 5/1118 (20130101); A61B 5/7285 (20130101); A61B 5/721 (20130101); A61B 5/02405 (20130101); A61B 5/02427 (20130101); A61B 5/02438 (20130101); A61B 5/0833 (20130101); A61B 5/486 (20130101); A61B 5/4815 (20130101); A61B 5/681 (20130101); A61B 5/725 (20130101); A61B 5/7278 (20130101); A61B 5/165 (20130101); A61B 2562/0219 (20130101)
  9. How many claims: 29 claims

 

References:

[1] P. R. MacDonald and C. J. Kulach, “Heart Rate Monitor With Time Varying Linear Filtering.” U.S. Patent 9,801,587 B2, issued October 31, 2017.

[2] R. M. Aarts and M. Ouwerkerk, “Apparatus for Monitoring A Person’s Heart Rate And/Or Heart Variation; Wrist-Watch Comprising The Same.” U.S. Patent 2009/0048526 A1, issued February 19, 2009.

[3] S. K. Kim, J. S. Hwang, and K. H. Kim, “Method and Apparatus for Managing Exercise State of User.” U.S. Patent 7.867,142 B2, issued January 11, 2011.