Multimodal Integration of Wearable Sensor Signals for Ambulatory Gait and Posture Analysis

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Wireless, wearable sensor systems (WSS) capable of capturing continuous, objective metrics of gait and postural behavior offer new possibilities for human motor control research, monitoring and diagnosing rehabilitation outcomes for diagnosis, and control systems design of assistive technologies. Major technical challenges that limit the current applicability and efficiency of WSS include: 1) suboptimal accuracy and reliability in capturing detailed gait parameters, 2) few techniques to extract contextual information about the physical environment to interpret data, and 3) few validated approaches to analyze large, longitudinal datasets of gait and posture behaviour. The long-term goal of this research program is to advance the accuracy, reliability, and applicability of WSS for ambulatory gait and posture analysis.***The proposed research adopts a multimodal sensor integration approach to advance WSS tools to measure gait and postural control in an ambulatory fashion. The integration of candidate techniques, including spatial mapping and electrophysiological sensors, with widely-used body-worn motion sensors will be explored. To address anatomical and functional heterogeneity, electrophysiological signals will be acquired to provide insight into underlying neuromotor control strategies. The potential for localization and spatial mapping techniques to address the lack of concurrent contextual data will be evaluated. For example, the utility of sensor packages incorporating localization and 3D mapping techniques (e.g., Project Tango by Google, Inc.) to capture environmental information and infer mobility context will be examined. To integrate signals from multiple modalities, sensor fusion techniques drawn from control systems, machine learning, and health informatics fields will be explored.*** ***The research will contribute to establishing a centre of WSS expertise to foster internationally recognized research, technical innovation, and human capital for Canada. The proposed advances in WSS capabilities will have a major impact in providing foundational technology for future applications of WSS, principally for uses related to human motor control. Specifically, this program will provide new tools to examine gait and postural control in their natural context and expand the utilization of WSS for applied research (e.g., control of advanced assistive technologies such as exoskeletons, functional electrical stimulators). To meet the projected demands of an exploding mobile health technology (mHealth) market, this program will generate infrastructure for rapid innovation and support the training of highly sought biomedical engineering and health informatics human resources.**