Roman Kusche

• Professor
• HAW Hamburg

The reliable detection of muscle contractions in real-time is important for many applications. Both for prosthesis control and in the field of human-computer interaction, the physiological commands of the user must be recognized. However, conventional methods such as the electromyography are susceptible to interferences. A particularly robust metho...

The continuous acquisition of the arterial pulse wave can be used to determine the heart rate and to estimate the blood pressure. Existing wearables require special sensors and often only detect the pulse wave at the extremities from the peripheral blood vessels, far away from the heart and aorta. In addition, these wearables are sometimes expensiv...

An important aspect of mechanical ventilation is the recognition and quantification of spontaneous respiratory effort. However, measurement of flows and pressures often used for this purpose is prone to error. A promising alternative is to detect diaphragmatic contractions, directly. A method recently proposed is to acquire the diaphragm EMG signal...

Surface electromyography (sEMG) records the electrical potentials on the skin surface generated by the electrical activity of muscle fibers. To better understand physiology and to assess signal processing algorithms, sEMG models have been developed in the past. However, numerical models required for modeling accurate geometries very often have a hi...

Body Surface Potential Mapping is the spatial high-resolution acquisition of cardiac electrical activity from the thorax surface. The method is used to record more comprehensive cardiac information than conventional ECG measurement approaches. Although Body Surface Potential Mapping is well-known and is technically feasible, it is rarely used in cl...

The electrocardiogram (ECG) is a well-known technique used to diagnose cardiac diseases. To acquire the spatial signal characteristics from the thorax, multiple electrodes are commonly used. Displacements of electrodes affect the signal morphologies and can lead to incorrect diagnoses. For quantitative analysis of these effects we propose the usage...

EMG is an established method to acquire the action potentials of contracted muscles. Although commercial EMG systems are available and it is one of the most researched biosignals, it has never become widely used in rehabilitation or fitness training monitoring. The reasons are technical challenges of wearable EMG systems regarding electrode placeme...

EMG is an established method to acquire the action potentials of contracted muscles. Although commercial EMG systems are available and it is one of the most researched biosignals, it has never become widely used in rehabilitation or fitness training monitoring. The reasons are technical challenges of wearable EMG systems regarding electrode placeme...

The electrocardiogram (ECG) is a well-known technique used to diagnose cardiac diseases. To acquire the spatial signal characteristics from the thorax, multiple electrodes are commonly used. Displacements of electrodes affect the signal morphologies and can lead to incorrect diagnoses. For quantitative analysis of these effects we propose the usage...

Objective: Electric hand prostheses are typically controlled using electromyographic (EMG) signals recorded from the residual muscles. However, non-stationarities that are characteristic for EMG interfaces impair the reliability of machine-learning-based approaches during daily life activities-based approaches (e.g., the limb position effect). Incl...

Indoor positioning approaches are often based on electromagnetic wave signals with high frequency. However, signal reflections and the corresponding signal superpositions are challenging. As a result, there is still no indoor positioning technology established in commercial products, such as smartphones or smartwatches. Recent publications have sho...

Exploration of natural and artificial underwater structures is an actual field in development and research projects. Acoustic detection methods are well known and can be used to create seabed and subbottom profiles. The systems have limitations for detection of small objects, especially in presence of large acoustic reflectors. The detection of fla...

Wie in Abschnitt 2.2 beschrieben, gibt es verschiedene Messansätze, für die das zeitliche Verhalten und die Form der Pulswelle an unterschiedlichen Messorten von Interesse sind. Um dazu die Pulswelle vom Körper abzuleiten, werden häufig Blutdruckmanschetten oder optische PPG-Sensoren verwendet [3, 123, 127]. Neben dem Nachteil, dass das Inflatieren...

Wie zu Beginn dieser Arbeit beschrieben, kann die Bioimpedanzmessung für verschiedenste Anwendungsgebiete genutzt werden. Da bereits festgelegt wurde, dass in dieser Arbeit voranging simultane Mehrkanal-Messungen in Abhängigkeit der Zeit zur Pulswellen- und Muskelkontraktions-Detektion durchgeführt werden sollen, liegt der Schwerpunkt dieses Kapite...

Insbesondere in der Prothetik wird das EMG zur Detektion von Muskelkontraktionen genutzt, um diese in entsprechende Steuerbefehle an die Prothese zu übersetzen [16]. Um die Risiken fehlerhafter Prothesenbewegungen möglichst gering zu halten, ist eine hohe Zuverlässigkeit der Signalerkennung und -Interpretation daher äußerst wichtig. Wie in Abschnit...

Ziel dieser Arbeit war die Entwicklung von Bioimpedanz-Messansätzen und -Instrumentierungen zur Verbesserung, Ergänzung oder als Ersatz herkömmlicher Monitoring-Messverfahren. Als besonderer Schwerpunkt wurden Mehrkanal-Ansätze angestrebt, um transiente physiologische Ereignisse simultan an mehreren Messorten detektieren zu können.

In diesem Kapitel werden die Grundlagen der in dieser Arbeit verwendeten biomedizinischen Messverfahren beschrieben. Zu Beginn werden die Eigenschaften der elektrischen Bioimpedanz und das Grundprinzip der Bioimpedanzmessung erklärt. Anschließend folgt ein Abschnitt über die Grundlagen der elektrischen Impedanzplethysmographie, der Detektion von ar...

Zur Entwicklung neuer biomedizinischer Messverfahren werden theoretische Ansätze, technische Umsetzungen und Charakterisierungen von Mehrkanal-Bioimpedanz-Instrumentierungen vorgestellt. Diese ermöglichen die simultane Messung der passiven elektrischen Gewebeeigenschaften an unterschiedlichen Körperstellen. Es wird gezeigt, wie aus den abgeleiteten...

Muscle contraction is often detected via EMG in prosthetics. However, signal disturbances due to electrode motions can lead to misinterpretations. Therefore, alternative measurement approaches are desired to increase the reliability of the results. In this work, a novel approach based on impedance myography is proposed. By means of an equivalent ci...

Muscle contraction is often detected via EMG in prosthetics. However, signal disturbances due to electrode motions can lead to misinterpretations. Therefore, alternative measurement approaches are desired to increase the reliability of the results. In this work, a novel approach based on impedance myography is proposed. By means of an equivalent ci...

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) is an imaging method that is able to estimate the electrical conductivity distribution of living tissue. This work presents a field programmable gate array (FPGA)-based multi-frequency EIT system for complex, time-resolved bioimpedance measurements. The system has the capability to work with measurement setups...

Bioimpedance measurements are a non-invasive method to determine the composition of organic tissue. For measuring the complex bioimpedance between two electrodes, an alternating current with a constant amplitude is injected into the tissue. The developed voltage drop is used to calculate the real and imaginary part of the impedance under test. Meas...

The measurement of the pulse wave has proven to be a vital tool in medical diagnosis. Whereby most pulse wave measurements are carried out at extremities, this work proposes a system for measuring the pulse wave and the Pulse Arrival Time (PAT) in the interior of the ear. The developed measurement device is based on a battery powered microcontrolle...

Pulse wave measurements provide vital information in medical diagnosis. For this reason, a measurement system is developed for determining the transient time of the pulse wave between the heart and the ear. To detect pressure variations in the sealed ear canal, caused by the arriving pulse wave, an in-ear sensor is developed which uses heart sounds...

The measurement of the pulse wave has proven to be a vital tool in medical diagnosis. Whereby most pulse wave measurements are carried out at extremities, this work proposes a system for measuring the pulse wave and the Pulse Arrival Time (PAT) in the interior of the ear. The developed measurement device is based on a battery powered microcontrolle...

Contact-free detection of human vital signs like heart rate and respiration rate will improve the patients' comfort and enables long-term monitoring of newborns or bedridden patients. For that, reliable and safe measurement techniques are indispensable. The aim of this work is the development and comparison of novel ultrasonic and capacitive measur...

Contact-free detection of human vital signs like heart rate and respiration rate will improve the patients’ comfort and enables long-term monitoring of newborns or bedridden patients. For that, reliable and safe measurement techniques are indispensable. The aim of this work is the development and comparison of novel ultrasonic and capacitive measur...

Objective: Bioimpedance measurements are mostly performed utilizing gel electrodes to decrease the occurring electrode-skin impedance. Since in many measurement environments this kind of electrode is not appropriate, the usability of dry electrodes is analysed. Approach: The development of five different kinds of dry electrodes, including gold, sta...

Objective: Muscle contractions are commonly detected by performing EMG measurements. The major disadvantage of this technique is that mechanical disturbances to the electrodes are in the same frequency and magnitude range as the desired signal. In this work we propose an approach and a realized measurement system to combine EMG and bioimpedance mea...

Muscle contractions are commonly detected by performing EMG measurements. The major disadvantage of this technique is that mechanical disturbances to the electrodes are in the same frequency and magnitude range as the desired signal. In this work we propose an approach and a realized measurement system to combine EMG and bioimpedance measurements f...

The determination of the physical characteristic of the human arterial system, especially the stiffness of the aorta, is of major interest for estimating the risk of cardiovascular diseases. The most common measurement technique to get information about the state of the arterial system is the pulse wave analysis. It includes the measurement of the...

A common technique to measure diaphragm electrical activation is the acquisition of the occurring electromyography signals using surface electrodes. A significant problem of this technique is its sensitivity against motion artifacts. Forces or vibrations can influence the electrode skin contacts, which generate changes of the electrodes’ half-cell...

Bioimpedance measurement is a biomedical technique to determine the electrical behavior of living tissue. It is well known for estimating the body composition or for the electrical impedance tomography. Additionally to these major research topics, there are applications with completely different system requirements for the signal acquisition. These...

Objective: Arterial stiffness is an important marker to predict cardio vascular events. Common measurement techniques to determine the condition of the aorta are limited to the acquisition of the arterial pulse wave at the extremities. The goal of this work is to enable non-invasive measurements of the aortic pulse wave velocity, instead. An additi...

Objective: Arterial stiffness is an important marker to predict cardio vascular events. Common measurement techniques to determine the condition of the aorta are limited to the acquisition of the arterial pulse wave at the extremities. The goal of this work is to enable non-invasive measurements of the aortic pulse wave velocity, instead. An addit...

The morphology and velocity of the pulse wave in the arteries provide meaningful information about the cardiovascular system. Nowadays, the pulse wave is usually acquired using common blood pressure cuffs at the extremities. This work describes a new measurement device which detects changes in bioimpedance due to the pulse wave. The system is able...

Pulse wave analysis is an important method used to gather information about the cardiovascular system. Instead of detecting the pulse wave via pressure sensors, bioimpedance measurements can be performed to acquire minuscule changes in the conductivity of the tissue, caused by the pulse wave. This work presents a microcontroller-based bioimpedance...

Objective: Bioimpedance measurements are mostly performed utilizing gel electrodes to decrease the occurring electrode-skin impedance. Since in many measurement environments this kind of electrode is not appropriate, the usability of dry electrodes is analysed. Approach: The development of five different kinds of dry electrodes, including gold, sta...

Pulse wave analysis is an important method used to gather information about the cardiovascular system. Instead of detecting the pulse wave via pressure sensors, bioimpedance measurements can be performed to acquire minuscule changes in the conductivity of the tissue, caused by the pulse wave. This work presents a microcontroller-based bioimpedance...

ePoster

ePoster

The morphology and velocity of the pulse wave in the arteries provide meaningful information about the cardio-vascular system. Nowadays, the pulse wave is usually acquired using common blood pressure cuffs at the extremities. This work describes a new measurement device which detects changes in bioimpedance due to the pulse wave. The system is able...

The most important issue of prosthesis control is to get the correct control signal. In most studies, there is only one kind of signal applied to control the prosthesis, which is prone to error. In this study, a platform including measurement circuit and monitor software was developed to acquire mechanomyography (MMG) and electromyography (EMG) sig...

Bioimpedance measurements have become a useful technique in the past several years in biomedical engineering. Especially, multi-channel measurements facilitate new imaging and patient monitoring techniques. While most instrumentation research has focused on signal acquisition and signal processing, this work proposes the design of an excitation cur...

Pulse wave measurements provide vital information in medical diagnosis. For this reason, a measurement system is developed for determining the transient time of the pulse wave between the heart and the ear. To detect pressure variations in the sealed ear canal, caused by the arriving pulse wave, an in-ear sensor is developed which uses heart sounds...

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) is an imaging method that is able to estimate the electrical conductivity distribution of living tissue. This work presents a field programmable gate array (FPGA)-based multi-frequency EIT system for complex, time-resolved bioimpedance measurements. The system has the capability to work with measurement setups...

Conventional methods to evaluate the size of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) and their coatings used in magnetic particle imaging (MPI) include photon cross-correlation spectroscopy (PCCS) [1], atomic force microscopy (AFM) [1] and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) [2]. There is however still a potential for improvement as...

The measurement of the pulse wave has proven to be a vital tool in medical diagnosis. Whereby most pulse wave measurements are carried out at extremities, this work proposes a system for measuring the pulse wave and the Pulse Arrival Time (PAT) in the interior of the ear. The developed measurement device is based on a battery powered microcontrolle...

The measurement of the pulse wave has proven to be a vital tool in medical diagnosis. Whereby most pulse wave measurements are carried out at extremities, this work proposes a system for measuring the pulse wave and the Pulse Arrival Time (PAT) in the interior of the ear. The developed measurement device is based on a battery powered microcontrolle...