Smart & automatic analysis of ocular nystagmus for tracking patients and astronaut health.

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The second most frequent complaint bringing patients to medical clinics or hospital ERs is dizziness or nausea (~1,400 patients/yr at just one McGill hospital). There are many causes of these symptoms: we focus on new tools to evaluate sensory deficits. Signals from vestibular sensors in the inner ear (head motion), and from the retina (visual goals), co-drive brain circuits that control balance and eye movements. The functional limits of responses to vestibular and visual stimuli are measured with eye recordings, but methods to test ocular reflexes have not changed for decades, using large and expensive equipment, and analyzing eye records with subjective criteria incompatible with current neuro-scientific knowledge. Another complication is that ocular reflexes are hybrid responses - switching back and forth between compensation for motion and redirection to a new spatial goal, each with different dynamics. Hence a major impediment for improvement of diagnostic procedures is the lack of modern techniques for automatic classification of nystagmus segments, which restricts feasible test protocols.