A K-band Noninvasive Vital Signs Monitoring System in Automotive Applications

In this paper, a K-band noninvasive vital signs monitoring system for measuring respiration rate and heart rate is presented. The system consists of a 24 GHz Doppler Radar motion sensor and an ARM-based digital signal processing unit. To demonstrate an automotive application, the system is designed to be installed on the vehicle, monitor the vital signs of the drivers, and activate a warning system automatically in which the vital signs of driver is abnormal. The errors of respiration rate and heart rate measurements are 2.3% and 8.6% respectively when there is a driver in front of the sensor. The error increases to 12.5% of respiration rate and no signal detected of heart rate in case the sensor measures on the side of the driver. The measurement results are stored on an open-source data server for remote monitoring and future investigation.