CAREER: Earable Systems: Enabling Ear-worn Sensing and Actuating Systems for Health Care and Brain-Computer Interactions

职业：耳戴式系统：实现用于医疗保健和脑机交互的耳戴式传感和驱动系统

• 批准号: 1846541
• 负责人: Tam Vu
• 金额: $ 54.04万
• 依托单位: University of Colorado at Boulder
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-02-15 至 2025-01-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1846541&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Earable; Systems; Enabling; Ear

The human head houses many important physiological signals such as brain signals (EEG), facial muscle signals (EMG), eye signals (EOG), etc. which have tremendous value in inferring the user's mental, physiological, and physical states. In addition, it also serves as an ideal body part for applying brain stimulations. However, most of the existing head-based sensing and stimulation methods are cumbersome, intrusive, and expensive, mostly suitable only for stationary and short-term usages such as in clinics or hospitals. This project aims to fill that gap by enabling a novel form of wearable sensing and actuating systems that can unobtrusively, continuously, comfortably, and simultaneously sense a multitude of head-based physiological signals and actuate to stimulate the brain while remaining minimally visible to the public. While the well-accepted form factors for wearable devices are watches, glasses, and other kinds of body-worn form factors, this work takes a drastically different approach, an ear-worn sensing and actuation approach (called Earable Systems) to tame a problem that has long hindered the deployment of head-based wearable systems, namely user acceptance, by making the wearable devices more socially acceptable and less visible to the public. The intellectual merit of this project stems from the key research activities. The activities include: formulating multiple head-based signal propagation models to and from human ears using superposition principle of wave propagation; developing algorithms, experimental hardware blocks, analytical models, and software libraries for sensing individual head-based physiological signals; developing closed-loop stimulation techniques, associated hardware, analytical tools, and safety guidelines for effective and safe just-in-time brain stimulation from the ears; and evaluating Earable Systems and the proposed platform in-lab for a compelling and practical application. This project's broader impacts stem from an integrated program of education, research and outreach that will translate the research results into demonstrations and hands-on experiences for under-served middle school students and local teachers through lab visits and summer workshops. It will also provide a unique interdisciplinary education for future engineering and healthcare workforce. It will also provide insight to future healthcare technologies through two Open Online Courses (MOOCs) for clinicians and undergraduate engineering students. And, both undergraduate and graduate students will be involved in advanced interdisciplinary healthcare projects using Earable Systems concepts. The research has the potential to translate scientific discovery and technical knowledge into beneficial commercial products through industry outreach and internships.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

人头容纳许多重要的生理信号，例如大脑信号（EEG），面部肌肉信号（EMG），眼信号（EOG）等，它们在推断用户的心理，生理和身体状态方面具有巨大的价值。此外，它还是应用大脑刺激的理想身体部位。但是，大多数现有的基于头部的感应和刺激方法都是笨拙，侵入性且昂贵的，主要适用于静止和短期使用，例如在诊所或医院中。该项目的目的是通过实现一种新型的可穿戴感应和致动系统来填补这一空白，这些系统可以持续，舒适，舒适并同时感知到许多基于头部的生理信号，并刺激大脑，同时保持最低限度地吸引大脑。虽然可穿戴设备的良好被接受的形式是手表，眼镜和其他类型的身体磨损的形式，但这项工作采用了截然不同的方法，一种耐耳朵的感应和驱动方法（称为耳朵系统）来驯服一个问题，该问题长期阻碍了基于头部可耐磨性系统的部署，即通过使可靠的设备更加可靠地进行耐磨机构，并且可以使可靠的设备更加可靠地进行访问。该项目的智力优点源于关键研究活动。活动包括：使用波传播的叠加原理来制定多个基于头部的信号传播模型。开发算法，实验硬件块，分析模型和软件库，以感知基于头部的基于头部的生理信号；开发闭环刺激技术，相关的硬件，分析工具和安全指南，以从耳朵中有效且安全的智能脑刺激；并评估可耳式系统和拟议的平台在LAB中进行引人入胜且实用的应用。该项目的广泛影响源于一项综合的教育，研究和宣传计划，该计划将通过实验室访问和夏季讲习班将研究结果转化为服务不足的中学生和当地教师的演示和动手经验。 它还将为未来的工程和医疗保健员工提供独特的跨学科教育。 它还将通过两种开放的在线课程（MOOC）为临床医生和本科工程专业的学生提供对未来医疗技术的见解。 而且，本科生和研究生都将使用可耳式系统概念参与先进的跨学科医疗项目。这项研究有可能通过行业推广和实习将科学发现和技术知识转化为有益的商业产品。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的影响评估标准通过评估来支持的。

项目成果

Epileptic Seizure Detection and Experimental Treatment: A Review

• DOI: 10.3389/fneur.2020.00701
• 发表时间: 2020-07-21
• 期刊: FRONTIERS IN NEUROLOGY
• 影响因子: 3.4
• 作者: Kim, Taeho;Phuc Nguyen;Tam Vu
• 通讯作者: Tam Vu

eBP: FREQUENT AND COMFORTABLE BLOOD PRESSURE MONITORING FROM INSIDE HUMAN'S EARS

eBP：从人耳内进行频繁且舒适的血压监测

• DOI: 10.1145/3400713.3400721
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: GetMobile: Mobile Computing and Communications
• 作者: Bui, Nam;Pham, Nhat;Truong, Hoang;Nguyen, Phuc;Xiao, Jianliang;Deterding, Robin;Dinh, Thang;Vu, Tam
• 通讯作者: Vu, Tam

FaceSense: Sensing Face Touch with an Ear-worn System

• DOI: 10.1145/3478129
• 发表时间: 2021-09-01
• 期刊: PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACM ON INTERACTIVE MOBILE WEARABLE AND UBIQUITOUS TECHNOLOGIES-IMWUT
• 作者: Kakaraparthi, Vimal;Shao, Qijia;Vu, Tam
• 通讯作者: Vu, Tam

eBP: an ear-worn device for frequent and comfortable blood pressure monitoring

eBP：一种耳戴式设备，用于频繁、舒适地监测血压

• DOI: 10.1145/3470446
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Communications of the ACM
• 影响因子: 22.7
• 作者: Bui, Nam;Pham, Nhat;Barnitz, Jessica Jacqueline;Zou, Zhanan;Nguyen, Phuc;Truong, Hoang;Kim, Taeho;Farrow, Nicholas;Nguyen, Anh;Xiao, Jianliang
• 通讯作者: Xiao, Jianliang

eBP: A Wearable System For Frequent and Comfortable Blood Pressure Monitoring From User's Ear

eBP：一种可穿戴系统，可通过用户的耳朵进行频繁、舒适的血压监测

• DOI: 10.1145/3300061.3345454
• 发表时间: 2019
• 期刊: MobiCom '19: The 25th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking
• 作者: Bui, Nam;Pham, Nhat;Barnitz, Jessica Jacqueline;Zou, Zhanan;Nguyen, Phuc;Truong, Hoang;Kim, Taeho;Farrow, Nicholas;Nguyen, Anh;Xiao, Jianliang
• 通讯作者: Xiao, Jianliang