Reduction in the Motion Artifacts in Noncontact ECG Measurements Using a Novel Designed Electrode Structure.

A noncontact ECG is applicable to wearable bioelectricity acquisition because it can provide more comfort to the patient for long-term monitoring. However, the motion artifact is a significant source of noise in an ECG recording. Adaptive noise reduction is highly effective in suppressing motion artifact, usually through the use of external sensors, thus increasing the design complexity and cost. In this paper, a novel ECG electrode structure is designed to collect ECG data and reference data simultaneously. Combined with the adaptive filter, it effectively suppresses the motion artifact in the ECG acquisition. This method adds one more signal acquisition channel based on the single-channel ECG acquisition system to acquire the reference signal without introducing other sensors. Firstly, the design of the novel ECG electrode structure is introduced based on the principle of noise reduction. Secondly, a multichannel signal acquisition circuit system and ECG electrodes are implemented. Finally, experiments under normal walking conditions are carried out, and the performance is verified by the experiment results, which shows that the proposed design effectively suppresses motion artifacts and maintains the stability of the signal quality during the noncontact ECG acquisition. The signal-to-noise ratio of the ECG signal after noise reduction is 14 dB higher than that of the original ECG signal with the motion artifact.

An Identification Method for Rotor Direction Based on Charge Induction.

The detection of rotor motion is always key to ensure the normal operation of industrial sewing machines. This paper presents a novel method for rotor detection based on charge induction mechanism, which is suitable for industrial environments with high noise and electromagnetic radiation and is easy to install. Firstly, the principle of measuring rotor rotation based on charge induction is given. Then, the detection model of rotor direction identification based on two detection electrodes is established. Finally, details are given of the detection circuit design and the experiment that was carried out. The results show that the proposed method can effectively identify the noncontact rotor direction with and without occlusion, indicating that the method has excellent anti-interference capability. The accuracy of the method can be further improved by increasing the sampling rate and sampling points of the system.

Electrode Humidification Design for Artifact Reduction in Capacitive ECG Measurements.

For wearable capacitive electrocardiogram (ECG) acquisition, capacitive electrodes may cause severe motion artifacts due to the relatively large friction between the electrodes and the dielectrics. In some studies, water can effectively suppress motion artifacts, but these studies lack a complete analysis of how water can suppress motion artifacts. In this paper, the effect of water on charge decay of textile electrode is studied systematically, and an electrode controllable humidification design using ultrasonic atomization is proposed to suppress motion artifacts. Compared with the existing electrode humidification designs, the proposed electrode humidification design can be controlled by a program to suppress motion artifacts at different ambient humidity, and can be highly integrated for wearable application. Firstly, the charge decay mode of the textile electrode is given and it is found that the process of free water evaporation at an appropriate free water content can be the dominant way of triboelectric charge dissipation. Secondly, theoretical analysis and experiment verification both illustrate that water contained in electrodes can accelerate the decay of triboelectric charge through the free water evaporation path. Finally, a capacitive electrode controllable humidification design is proposed by applying integrated ultrasonic atomization to generate atomized drops and spray them onto textile electrodes to accelerate the decay of triboelectric charge and suppress motion artifacts. The performance of the proposed design is verified by the experiment results, which shows that the proposed design can effectively suppress motion artifacts and maintain the stability of signal quality at both low and high ambient humidity. The signal-to-noise ratio of the proposed design is 33.32 dB higher than that of the non-humidified design at 25% relative humidity and is 22.67 dB higher than that of non-humidified electrodes at 65% relative humidity.