A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array
Commercial, high-tech upper limb prostheses offer a lot of functionality and are equipped with high-grade control mechanisms. However, they are relatively expensive and are not accessible to the majority of amputees. Therefore, more affordable, accessible, open-source, and 3D-printable alternatives...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2024-02-01
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| Series: | Sensors |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/24/4/1119 |
| _version_ | 1797297109676851200 |
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| author | Kenneth Deprez Eliah De Baecke Mauranne Tijskens Ruben Schoeters Maarten Velghe Arno Thielens |
| author_facet | Kenneth Deprez Eliah De Baecke Mauranne Tijskens Ruben Schoeters Maarten Velghe Arno Thielens |
| author_sort | Kenneth Deprez |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Commercial, high-tech upper limb prostheses offer a lot of functionality and are equipped with high-grade control mechanisms. However, they are relatively expensive and are not accessible to the majority of amputees. Therefore, more affordable, accessible, open-source, and 3D-printable alternatives are being developed. A commonly proposed approach to control these prostheses is to use bio-potentials generated by skeletal muscles, which can be measured using surface electromyography (sEMG). However, this control mechanism either lacks accuracy when a single sEMG sensor is used or involves the use of wires to connect to an array of multiple nodes, which hinders patients’ movements. In order to mitigate these issues, we have developed a circular, wireless s-EMG array that is able to collect sEMG potentials on an array of electrodes that can be spread (not) uniformly around the circumference of a patient’s arm. The modular sEMG system is combined with a Bluetooth Low Energy System on Chip, motion sensors, and a battery. We have benchmarked this system with a commercial, wired, state-of-the-art alternative and found an r = 0.98 (<i>p</i> < 0.01) Spearman correlation between the root-mean-squared (RMS) amplitude of sEMG measurements measured by both devices for the same set of 20 reference gestures, demonstrating that the system is accurate in measuring sEMG. Additionally, we have demonstrated that the RMS amplitudes of sEMG measurements between the different nodes within the array are uncorrelated, indicating that they contain independent information that can be used for higher accuracy in gesture recognition. We show this by training a random forest classifier that can distinguish between 6 gestures with an accuracy of 97%. This work is important for a large and growing group of amputees whose quality of life could be improved using this technology. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-07T22:15:31Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-ff0261b08e8f4eb5962fa81578524979 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1424-8220 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-07T22:15:31Z |
| publishDate | 2024-02-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Sensors |
| spelling | doaj.art-ff0261b08e8f4eb5962fa815785249792024-02-23T15:33:37ZengMDPI AGSensors1424-82202024-02-01244111910.3390/s24041119A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography ArrayKenneth Deprez0Eliah De Baecke1Mauranne Tijskens2Ruben Schoeters3Maarten Velghe4Arno Thielens5Department of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumDepartment of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumDepartment of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumDepartment of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumDepartment of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumDepartment of Information Technology, imec, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, BelgiumCommercial, high-tech upper limb prostheses offer a lot of functionality and are equipped with high-grade control mechanisms. However, they are relatively expensive and are not accessible to the majority of amputees. Therefore, more affordable, accessible, open-source, and 3D-printable alternatives are being developed. A commonly proposed approach to control these prostheses is to use bio-potentials generated by skeletal muscles, which can be measured using surface electromyography (sEMG). However, this control mechanism either lacks accuracy when a single sEMG sensor is used or involves the use of wires to connect to an array of multiple nodes, which hinders patients’ movements. In order to mitigate these issues, we have developed a circular, wireless s-EMG array that is able to collect sEMG potentials on an array of electrodes that can be spread (not) uniformly around the circumference of a patient’s arm. The modular sEMG system is combined with a Bluetooth Low Energy System on Chip, motion sensors, and a battery. We have benchmarked this system with a commercial, wired, state-of-the-art alternative and found an r = 0.98 (<i>p</i> < 0.01) Spearman correlation between the root-mean-squared (RMS) amplitude of sEMG measurements measured by both devices for the same set of 20 reference gestures, demonstrating that the system is accurate in measuring sEMG. Additionally, we have demonstrated that the RMS amplitudes of sEMG measurements between the different nodes within the array are uncorrelated, indicating that they contain independent information that can be used for higher accuracy in gesture recognition. We show this by training a random forest classifier that can distinguish between 6 gestures with an accuracy of 97%. This work is important for a large and growing group of amputees whose quality of life could be improved using this technology.https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/24/4/1119Surface-ElectromyographyBluetooth Low Energygesture recognitionProsthetics |
| spellingShingle | Kenneth Deprez Eliah De Baecke Mauranne Tijskens Ruben Schoeters Maarten Velghe Arno Thielens A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array Sensors Surface-Electromyography Bluetooth Low Energy gesture recognition Prosthetics |
| title | A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array |
| title_full | A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array |
| title_fullStr | A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array |
| title_full_unstemmed | A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array |
| title_short | A Circular, Wireless Surface-Electromyography Array |
| title_sort | circular wireless surface electromyography array |
| topic | Surface-Electromyography Bluetooth Low Energy gesture recognition Prosthetics |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/24/4/1119 |
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