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posted by takyon on Wednesday September 02 2015, @08:00PM   Printer-friendly
from the wearable-anemia dept.

Electrical engineers at the University of California, San Diego demonstrated a new wireless communication technique that works by sending magnetic signals through the human body. The new technology could offer a lower power and more secure way to communicate information between wearable electronic devices, providing an improved alternative to existing wireless communication systems, researchers said. They presented their findings Aug. 26 at the 37th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society in Milan, Italy.

While this work is still a proof-of-concept demonstration, researchers envision developing it into an ultra low power wireless system that can easily transmit information around the human body. An application of this technology would be a wireless sensor network for full-body health monitoring.

"In the future, people are going to be wearing more electronics, such as smart watches, fitness trackers and health monitors. All of these devices will need to communicate information with each other. Currently, these devices transmit information using Bluetooth radios, which use a lot of power to communicate. We're trying to find new ways to communicate information around the human body that use much less power," said Patrick Mercier, a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at UC San Diego who led the study. Mercier also serves as the co-director of the UC San Diego Center for Wearable Sensors.

This could lead to many lab hijinks.


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Gravis on Wednesday September 02 2015, @10:36PM

    by Gravis (4596) on Wednesday September 02 2015, @10:36PM (#231474)

    it has to be a complete band around part of your body. :(

    Researchers noted that a limitation of this technique is that magnetic fields require circular geometries in order to propagate through the human body. Devices like smart watches, headbands and belts will all work well using magnetic field human body communication, but not a small patch that is stuck on the chest and used to measure heart rate, for example. As long as the wearable application can wrap around a part of the body, it should work just fine with this technique, researchers explained.

    replace Bluetooth earpieces with magnetic headbands?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 02 2015, @11:19PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 02 2015, @11:19PM (#231481)

    yes, it's called the right hand rule.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by VortexCortex on Wednesday September 02 2015, @11:46PM

    by VortexCortex (4067) on Wednesday September 02 2015, @11:46PM (#231488)

    limited usefulness

    On the contrary! There are multitudes of uses when combined with other electrical medical applications. Why, your heart rate sensing wrist band could detect increased activity and tell your waist band to stimulate your spine and reduce pain. [spine-health.com] When combined with social media depression detection [nytimes.com] it could detect when you're agitated and engage your mind controlling hatband / sweatband to treat your depression. [clinph-journal.com] You've got to think beyond communication applications: A band around your head, waist, or chest, wrist, ankle, etc. is just the sort of shape one needs for other EM induction devices.

    The technology's cumbersome form factor may be of no issue to people labeled as anything from schizophrenic to depressive with new legislation coming down the pike that would criminalize not using prescribed mental treatments as a natural outcome of certain mental health court policies [mentalhealthamerica.net]; Some may not have a choice but to wear such body antennas in the future. Let's think bigger! Some schools already have students wear devices to monitor their receptiveness to mind numbing Common Core curriculum [dianeravitch.net], they could use trans-body wireless communication to switch on a hat's speech nullification field. [medicalxpress.com] Just imagine the possibilities with GPS or proximity sensors. Hold hands with your lover to engage orgasmatron. [bbc.com] Touch a doorknob you're not supposed to, your wrist phone informs the authorities, and if you've got a brain implant, head band or spinal stimulator you'll be incapacitated -- Or maybe the door just unlocks...

    Whatever you do, do not question whether it's safe to pump electromagnetic fields through organisms with electrochemical nervous systems, and DO NOT allege that electromagnetic fields may be used to manipulate people's minds without their consent, especially not remotely. Ignore the patents, that is simply not possible, Citizen. [google.com]

    In any event, this crap better run on open hardware / and free (libre) open source software. If not, well, I've always wondered what it would be like to be a hacker in one of those fictional cyberpunk dystopias...

    TL;DR: Medical research proves putting EM into your body can affect your health, so "communications" isn't the only application.

  • (Score: 1) by Some call me Tim on Thursday September 03 2015, @06:15AM

    by Some call me Tim (5819) on Thursday September 03 2015, @06:15AM (#231594)

    From what I've seen of Bluetooth earpiece wearing a-holes talking very loudly while wandering around the super market, a highly constrictive neck band would be an improvement.

    --
    Questioning science is how you do science!