| Acronym: SMART-CLOTHING |
| Main Objective: In the context of the solution being sought, a hierarchical communication system will be needed to deliver the data from the WBAN that is installed in pregnant woman. Although the main focus of SMART-CLOTHING is to produce the sensors integrated into the clothes and to integrate them into the WBAN, broader WSAN (Wireless Sensor and Actuator Network) solutions are being envisaged. e.g., in the context of high competition teams, where the objective is to design and develop instrumentation to support clinical intervention for the rehabilitation of neuro-muscular and muscular-skeletal functions caused by traumatic injuries that occurred either during sports activity. As the biomechanical analysis of the human movement needs a use of complex hardware and software systems, there is an opportunity for wireless communications and instrumentation and measurement research to integrate these devices into tiny wireless sensor devices, with simplified network capabilities, that will enlarge amplitude and freedom of the movements. In low risk pregnancies, between the medical sessions that occur weekly during the last five weeks of pregnancy, the foetal health can change suddenly. As a consequence, the majority of foetus fatalities in the end of pregnancy verifies in the low risk group. Therefore, it is important an obstetric tracing, allowing for the identification of sudden changes in the foetus health, by monitoring the foetus movements and the foetal cardiac (FC) frequency, and the development of easy to wear tele-medicine gear will allow for remotely monitoring the pregnant women, and the health of the baby she carries. The data delivery method is chosen by a decision device and the choice can be either the Wi-Fi system or the WiMAX system, or even the GSM system from a hierarchical network. One intends to distinguish the cases where mobility is a need from the remaining ones. A decision device should be incorporated between the WSN and the specific network that this device can choose to reach the Hospital, where the gynaecologist is. Contributions are being given on embedded microcontrollers for integration of clusters of motes into hierarchical communications networks. Embedded electronics with advanced sensing and communication capabilities is justified by the lack of general purpose WSANs that cope with heterogeneous application requirements. In SMART-CLOTHING, new algorithms and protocols are being developed to optimize the trade-off energy consumption/ processing and communication capabilities, namely in the MAC (Medium Access Control) layer and aspects of data aggregation. Cross-layer design between MAC and physical layers will be addressed, and the interactions with network and transport layers will be considered as well. |
| Reference: -- |
| Funding: iCentro |
| Start Date: 01-07-2007 |
| End Date: 01-06-2009 |
| Team: Sérgio Lebres, Fernando Jose da Silva Velez, , Pedro José Guerra de Araújo, Luís Miguel Moreira Borges, João M. Ferro, João Piteira, Jorge Miguel da Silva Tavares, Andreia Rente, Filipe Carvalho |
| Groups: Antennas and Propagation – Lx, Network Architectures and Protocols – Cv |
| Partners: University of Beira Interior, CHCB, Integration Inc. |
| Local Coordinator: Fernando Jose da Silva Velez |
| Links:
http://www.e-projects.ubi.pt/smart-clothing/ Internal Page |
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Associated Publications
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