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July 18, 2006
Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs is developing ways to determine vital signs such as respiration rates and heartbeat by reading cell phone signals bounced off the body, Newhouse News Service/Birmingham News reports.
The technology, called telesensing, could be used to prevent sudden infant death syndrome, diagnose sleep apnea and track fevers. Rescuers could use the technology to scan heart and breathing signals to determine whom to treat first in an emergency. Mobile phones within five years might include a telesensing chip that could provide runners with their heart and respiration rates or help monitor the vital signs of seniors and automatically call for help, according to Tod Sizer, director of broadband wireless research at Bell Labs.
Bell Labs is working on the research with former Bell Labs engineers at the University of Hawaii who have a three-year, $375,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. They are focusing on how to track signals from more than one person in the same area, Newhouse News Service/Birmingham News reports. Researchers are using technology derived from a system developed about 10 years ago by Bell Labs for retail and financial electronics maker NCR to change store prices via radio signals, Sizer said (Coughlin, Newhouse News Service/Birmingham News, 7/17).
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