EYEWEAR HAVING HUMAN ACTIVITY MONITORING DEVICE

• US 20090234614A1
• Filed: 04/23/2008
• Published: 09/17/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 04/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Fullpower Technologies Incorporated
• Inventors: Christensen, Mark Andrew, Kinsolving, Arthur, Kahn, Philippe, Lee, Brian Y., Vogel, David
• Granted Patent: US 7,987,070 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 702/141
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2562/0219 Inertial sensors, e.g. accelerometers, gyroscopes, tilt switches
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1118 Determining activity level
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1123 Discriminating type of movement, e.g. walking or running A61B5/1116, A61B5/112 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/486 Bio-feedback A61B5/375 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6803 Head-worn items, e.g. helmets, masks, headphones or goggles
• CPC Class Codes: G02C 11/10 Electronic devices other than hearing aids
• CPC Class Codes: G02C 5/001 specially adapted for particular purposes, not otherwise provided for or not fully classifiable according to technical characteristics, e.g. therapeutic glasses

Abstract

A method for monitoring human activity using an inertial sensor includes obtaining acceleration measurement data from an inertial sensor disposed in eyewear. The acceleration measurement data is processed to determine a user activity statistic. The user activity statistic includes at least one of a current user activity, periodic human motion count, total distance traveled, vertical distance traveled, current speed and average speed.

Claims

1. A method of monitoring user activity using an inertial sensor, comprising:

obtaining acceleration measurement data from an inertial sensor disposed in eyewear; and

processing the acceleration measurement data to determine a user activity statistic, the user activity statistic including at least one of an identification of a current user activity and a periodic human motion count for the current user activity.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

formatting the user activity statistic to a generic format readable by a plurality of devices; and

transmitting the formatted user activity statistic.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

monitoring a metric from an additional sensor; and

correlating the metric to the user activity statistic.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

using the correlation of the metric to the user activity statistic to increase accuracy of the user activity statistic.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing user feedback based the user activity statistic, the user feedback including at least one of aural, visual and tactile feedback.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the user feedback includes at least one of an indication to speed up and an indication to slow down.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein the visual feedback includes a display on a lens of the eyewear, the display being viewable to a user wearing the eyewear.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving user input to display a requested user activity statistic, the user input being received by at least one of a control mounted on the eyewear, a speech command, an external remote control wirelessly connected to the eyewear, and a motion command interface; and

displaying the requested user activity statistic.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining whether the eyewear is disposed on a user'"'"'s face, is otherwise disposed on the user, or is not disposed on the user.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

activating a first set of functions if the eyewear is disposed on the user'"'"'s face; and

activating a second set of functions if the eyewear is disposed elsewhere on the user.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the eyewear is disposed on a user'"'"'s face such that the eyewear is approximately aligned with an axis of symmetry of the user, the method further comprising:

identifying first accelerations caused by motions from a right half of the user'"'"'s body; and

identifying second accelerations caused by motions from a left half of the user'"'"'s body.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

identifying first steps taken by a left foot of the user;

identifying second steps taken by a right foot of the user; and

comparing acceleration measurements of the first steps to acceleration measurements of the second steps.

13. A machine-accessible medium including instructions that, when executed by a machine, cause the machine to perform a method comprising:

obtaining acceleration measurement data from an inertial sensor disposed in eyewear; and

processing the acceleration measurement data to determine a user activity statistic, the user activity statistic including at least one of an identification of a current user activity and a periodic human motion count for the current user activity.

14. The machine-accessible medium of claim 13, the method further comprising:

formatting the user activity statistic to a generic format readable by a plurality of devices; and

transmitting the formatted user activity statistic.

15. The machine-accessible medium of claim 13, further comprising:

monitoring a metric from an additional sensor; and

correlating the metric to the user activity statistic.

16. The machine-accessible medium of claim 13, the method further comprising:

providing user feedback based the user activity statistic, the user feedback including at least one of aural, visual and tactile feedback.

17. The machine-accessible medium of claim 16, wherein the visual feedback includes a display on a lens of the eyewear, the display being viewable to a user wearing the eyewear.

18. The machine-accessible medium of claim 13, the method further comprising:

receiving user input to display a requested user activity statistic, the user input being received by at least one of a control mounted on the eyewear, a speech command, an external remote control wirelessly connected to the eyewear, and a motion command interface; and

displaying the requested user activity statistic.

19. An inertial sensor based device, comprising:

eyewear;

an inertial sensor disposed in the eyewear to monitor accelerations; and

a processor disposed in the eyewear and coupled to the inertial sensor to receive acceleration measurement data from the inertial sensor, and to process the acceleration measurement data to determine a user activity statistic, the user activity statistic including at least one of the an identification of a current user activity and a periodic human motion count for the current user activity.

20. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

a transmitter to transmit the user activity statistic, wherein the user activity statistic is formatted to a generic format readable by a plurality of devices prior to transmission.

21. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

a memory to store at least one of the acceleration measurement data and the user activity statistic.

22. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

a feedback element to provide at least one of aural, visual and tactile feedback.

23. The inertial sensor based device of claim 22, wherein the feedback element is a display on a lens of the eyewear, the display being viewable to a user wearing the eyewear.

24. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

an additional sensor to provide a metric to correlate to the user activity statistic.

25. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

an input to receive user input, the input including least one of a control mounted on the eyewear, a speech command module, and a motion command interface module.

26. The inertial sensor based device of claim 19, further comprising:

a remote control wirelessly connected to the inertial sensor based device.