Respiratory Effort Harvesting
Date: Wed, October 23, 2013
Time: 12:20pm
Location: Kuykendall 310
Speaker: Ehsaneh Shahhaidar, Advisor: Dr. Olga Boric-Lubecke
Simultaneous sensing and parasitic energy harvesting of human respiratory effort may enable self-powered wearable biosensors that could provide a powerful tool for continuous medical monitoring.
Parasitic energy harvesting implies low metabolic burden with no onerous load felt by the body. In this project, first the available energy and power on the thoracic area due during normal breathing were estimated.
Doppler radar, accelerometer, and Infrared cameras were used to measure the torso movement for force, power, and energy estimation. Energy harvesting methods, including piezoelectric and electromagnetic generators, were investigated, and a miniature, lightweight (30g), electromagnetic generator was proven to be an efficient respiratory effort harvester and sensor. Human testing results have demonstrated that the energy expenditure difference due to wearing the harvesting device is negligible, proving that no metabolic burden was introduced by the harvesters.