Pulse wave detection method based on the bio-impedance of the wrist

The real-time monitoring of pulse rate can evaluate the heart health to some extent, and the measurement of bio-impedance has the potential in wearable health monitoring system. In this paper, an effective method, which contains self-balancing bridge, flexible electrode, and high-speed digital lock-in algorithm (DLIA) with over-sampling, was designed to detect the impedance pulse wave at the wrist. By applying the self-balancing bridge, the basic impedance can be compensated as much as possible, and the low amplitude of impedance variation related to heart pulse can be obtained more easily. And the flexible conductive rubber electrode used in our experiment is human-friendly. Besides, the over-sampling method and high-speed DLIA are used to enhance the effective resolution of the existing data sampled by analog to digital converter. With the high-speed data process and simple circuit above, this proposed method has the potential in wrist-band wearable systems and it can satisfy quests of small volume and low power consumption.