APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR MEASURING BIOLOGICAL INFORMATION

• US 20070078310A1
• Filed: 09/05/2006
• Published: 04/05/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 09/07/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: LG Electronics, Inc. (LG Corporation)
• Original Assignee: LG Electronics, Inc. (LG Corporation)
• Inventors: Lee, Kwy-Ro, Hong, Hyung-Ki, Lee, Youn-Jae, Oh, Hyun-Ho, Cho, Seong-Moon, Jung, Min-Jae
• Granted Patent: US 7,731,665 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/310
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0059 using light, e.g. diagnosis by transillumination, diascopy, fluorescence A61B5/0093, A61B5/1455, A61B5/02416 and A61B5/0261 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/02007 Evaluating blood vessel condition, e.g. elasticity, compliance
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/02416 using photoplethysmograph signals, e.g. generated by infrared radiation A61B5/14552 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4872 Body fat
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6824 Arm or wrist
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7239 using differentiation including higher order derivatives

Abstract

An apparatus and method for precisely measuring various biological information of a user'"'"'s body by using a single measuring apparatus enable precisely and effectively measuring biological information including body fat, pulse and a blood vessel aging degree. By measuring an infrared absorbance or infrared rays irradiated to a measurement target according to a modulation and tuning method and obtaining the information with reference to supplementary biological information obtained from a user, the plurality of biological information can be precisely measured at a low driving voltage through the modulation and tuning method by using a single infrared light source. Also, the measuring apparatus can be reduced in size by simplifying its construction and can be effectively integrated into various device.

Claims

1. An apparatus for measuring biological information comprising:

an input unit for enabling a user to select one of a body fat measurement mode, a pulse measurement mode and a blood vessel aging degree measurement mode;

a memory for storing biological information of the user;

infrared ray transmission and reception units for radiating infrared rays with a single wavelength of a certain range, and measuring an infrared absorbance of a certain portion of a user'"'"'s body by analyzing a reflected amount of the irradiated infrared rays;

a controller for calculating at least one of a body fat value, a pulse value and a blood vessel aging degree value by using the measured infrared absorbance and stored biological information according to the measurement mode selected by the input unit; and

a display unit for displaying at least one of the calculated body fat value, pulse value and blood vessel aging degree value.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the infrared ray transmission unit comprises at least one infrared light emitting diode and the infrared ray reception unit comprises one of at least one infrared sensitive photodiode and an infrared sensitive photo-transistor.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein when the body fat measurement mode is selected, the controller calculates the body fat value by using the measured infrared absorbance and at least one of weight, height, gender and an amount of exercise of the user corresponding to the biological information.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein when the pulse measurement mode is selected, the controller calculates the pulse value by analyzing a period of an amount change of the infrared absorbance measurement value.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein when the blood vessel aging degree measurement mode is selected, the controller calculates the blood vessel aging degree value by differentiating a signal change of the infrared absorbance measurement value by a certain number of times and analyzing the size and form of peaks of the differentiated signal.

6. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising:

a transmission driving unit connected with the infrared ray transmission and reception units for providing a drive signal for transmission based on a particular modulation wavelength; and

a reception driving unit connected with the infrared ray transmission and reception units, for tuning/demodulating a received signal and providing the processed signal to the controller.

7. An apparatus for measuring biological information, comprising:

a light emitting unit for operating a luminous element with a modulated signal toward a measurement target;

a light receiving unit for receiving light of the luminous element of the light emitting unit with respect to the measurement target and providing a measurement voltage;

a tuning unit for tuning a signal from the light receiving unit to cancel a DC noise and an RF noise therein;

a matching unit for demodulating a signal from the tuning unit to cancel harmonic noise therein, and

a measurement controller for providing a corresponding biological signal measurement result based on an output signal of the matching unit.

8. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein the light emitting unit comprises:

a luminous element operating according to a driving voltage applied thereto; and

a luminous element driving unit for providing the driving voltage to the luminous element according to the modulation signal provided by the measurement controller.

9. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein at least one of the tuning unit and the matching unit comprises an amplifying unit for amplifying an input signal.

10. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein the tuning unit further comprises a band-pass filter unit for canceling a DC noise and a nose due to supplied power and external light from a light signal received through the light receiving unit.

11. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein the matching unit further comprises a demodulation unit for demodulating an output signal of the tuning unit and a low-pass filter unit for canceling harmonic noise according to the demodulation.

12. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein the measurement controller selectively provides a modulation signal for driving the luminous element of the light emitting unit and provides a modulation signal to the matching unit to be used as the basis of the demodulation.

13. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein one or all of the tuning unit and the matching unit are included as a portion of the measurement controller and the functions thereof are performed by a digital signal processing.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the measurement controller changes characteristics of the tuning unit and the matching unit according to a biological signal to be measured.

15. A method for measuring biological information, comprising:

selecting one of a body fat measurement mode, a pulse measurement mode and a blood vessel aging degree measurement mode;

irradiating infrared rays with a single wavelength of a certain range to a particular portion of a user'"'"'s body, and measuring an infrared absorbance of the user'"'"'s body by analyzing a reflected amount of the irradiated infrared rays;

calculating at least one of a body fat value, a pulse value and a blood vessel aging degree value using the thusly measured infrared absorbance and pre-set user biological information according to the selected measurement mode; and

displaying at least one of the calculated body fat value, the pulse value and the blood vessel aging degree value.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein, in the calculating step, when the body fat measurement mode is selected, a body fat value is calculated by using the measured infrared absorbance and at least one of weight, height, gender and an amount of exercise of the user corresponding to the biological information.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein, in the calculating step, when the pulse measurement mode is selected, a pulse value is calculated by analyzing a period of an amount change of the infrared absorbance measurement value.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein, in the calculating step, when the blood vessel aging degree measurement mode is selected, the blood vessel aging degree value is calculated by differentiating a signal change of the infrared absorbance measurement value by a certain number of times and analyzing sizes and forms of peaks of the differentiated signal.

19. The method of claim 15, wherein the step of measuring the infrared absorbance comprises:

modulating the infrared rays with a modulation signal and irradiating them;

receiving an amount of reflection of the radiated infrared rays as an electrical signal; and

demodulating the received electrical signal based on the modulation signal.

20. A method for measuring biological information comprising:

illuminating a light source based on a modulation signal;

receiving light according to the light source and canceling a DC noise and an RF noise;

demodulating the noise-canceled signal and removing harmonics therefrom; and

calculating a corresponding biological signal measurement result based on the harmonic and noise-canceled signal.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the step of receiving the light signal and canceling noise comprises:

performing band-pass filtering on the received light signal to cancel the DC noise and noise due to external power and external lighting.

22. The method of claim 20, wherein the step of canceling the harmonic noise comprises:

performing low-pass filtering to remove an RF signal existing outside a measurement range of interest.

23. A mobile terminal comprising:

a keypad for enabling a user to select one of a body fat measurement mode, a pulse measurement mode and a blood vessel aging degree measurement mode;

a memory for storing biological information of the user;

infrared ray transmission and reception units for irradiating infrared rays with a single wavelength of a certain range, and measuring an infrared absorbance of a certain portion of a user'"'"'s body by analyzing an amount of infrared rays reflected therefrom,

a controller for calculating at least one of a body fat value, a pulse value and a blood vessel aging degree value by using the measured infrared absorbance and biological information according to the measurement mode selected by the user;

a voice conversion unit for converting at least one of the calculated body fat valuer the pulse value and the blood vessel aging degree value into a voice signal and sounding the voice signal; and

a display unit for displaying at least one of the calculated body fat value, the pulse value and the blood vessel aging degree value.

24. A remote controller, comprising:

a keypad for enabling a user to select one of a body fat measurement mode, a pulse measurement mode and a blood vessel aging degree measurement mode;

a memory for storing biological information of the user;

infrared ray transmission and reception units for radiating infrared rays with a single wavelength of a certain range, and measuring an infrared absorbance value of a certain portion of the user'"'"'s body by analyzing an amount of the irradiated infrared rays reflected therefrom;

a microcomputer for calculating at least one of a body fat value, a pulse value and a blood vessel aging degree value by using the measured infrared absorbance value and biological information according to the measurement mode selected by the user;

a local area communication unit for transmitting at least one of the calculated body fat value, the pulse value and the blood vessel aging degree value to an external electronic device having a display unit.

25. The remote controller of claim 24, wherein the local area communication unit is at least one of an infrared data association (IrDA) device, a Bluetooth device and a ZigBee device.