STTR Phase I: Non-Touch Infant Vital Sign Monitor

这一小企业技术转让（STTR）第一阶段项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力是改善对婴儿猝死综合症呼吸停止的检测。这将导致一个便携式设备的长期监测婴儿？的生命体征，而不需要任何传感器被放置在接触婴儿。拟议的项目有望在一个新成立的小企业、一所工程学院和一个主要健康科学中心之间的公私伙伴关系的背景下改善婴幼儿的福祉。通过使用低成本半导体片上系统为每个家庭提供生命体征监测，它可以成为婴儿监视器市场的游戏规则改变产品。拟议中的技术指向其他新的用途，如癫痫发作的检测和随后的研究，在预测睡眠呼吸暂停，帕金森？此外，该系统还可用于非医疗应用，如地震、火灾受害者的远程搜救监测、边境巡逻、入口安全和透视墙雷达。一个成功的结果将有助于公司的增长，美国和全球销售，以及美国的经济竞争力。拟议的项目将开发和展示一种替代目前的监测器，需要与婴儿接触。它将把一种新的片上解决方案集成到一个低成本的便携式设备中，用于在不接触婴儿的情况下长期监测生命体征。目的是设计一个商业互补金属氧化物半导体（CMOS）工艺的芯片，以确保低成本和低功耗。该研究将重点关注呼吸和心跳引起的生理运动的雷达非接触测量。此外，还将研究设计一个天线阵列，以发送射频信号，该信号将从人体反射回来，并通过心跳和呼吸引起的生理运动进行相位调制。结果将是具有紧凑尺寸的波束转向雷达，并且将消除零检测点，使得生命体征活动的检测将不受婴儿的位置或雷达残余相位的影响。这种装置的大规模生产成本将显著低于目前采用的系统。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase-I project is to improve the detection of cessation of respiration with regard to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. It will result in a portable device for long-term monitoring of baby?s vital signs without requiring any sensor to be placed in touch with a baby. The proposed project promises to result in improved wellbeing of infants and young children in the context of a public/private partnership between a newly formed small business, a College of Engineering and a major Health Sciences Center. By making vital sign monitoring available to every family with a low-cost semiconductor system-on-chip, it can be a game-changing product for the baby monitor market. The proposed technology points to other novel uses such as a detection of epileptic seizures and subsequent research in predicting sleep apnea, Parkinson?s disease, as well as non-medical applications such as remote monitoring of search-and-rescue for earthquake, fire victims; border patrol; entrance security; and see-through-wall radar. A successful result will contribute to the growth of the company, U.S. and global sales, and the economic competitiveness of the U.S.The proposed project will develop and demonstrate an alternative to current monitors which require contact with the baby. It will integrate a novel on-chip solution into a low-cost portable device for long-term monitoring of vital signs without baby contact. The objective is to design a chip in a commercial complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) process to ensure low cost and low-power. The research will focus on radar non-contact measurement of physiological movements caused by breathing and heartbeat. Research will also be conducted on designing an antenna array to send a radio frequency signal, which will be reflected back from the human body and phase-modulated by physiological movements due to heartbeat and respiration. The result will be beam steering radar with a compact size and will eliminate the null detection point, so that detection of the vital sign activity will not be affected by either the position of the infant or the radar residue phase. The mass production cost of such a device will be significantly lower than currently employed systems.