With Principal Research Scientist Sungmee Park, Jayaraman has designed fabric with a network of embedded sensors that covers the seat of a wheelchair. Conductive material is woven into the textile, and it’s washable without degrading the sensors.
Data about pressure and moisture from the sensors feeds into a processing unit that uses artificial intelligence algorithms to identify trouble spots in real time and selectively raise or lower a series of actuators under the wheelchair seat to relieve pressure. That has the advantage of eliminating any shearing forces on the skin that come from sliding against the seat.
Meanwhile, a series of fans activates to eliminate moisture. A companion smartphone app developed in the lab allows users to override the system to maintain comfort and stability — particularly important for people with spinal cord injuries who may not be able to correct their body position on their own.
“Each person moves differently. This system gathers all the pressure and moisture data and also accounts for different body compositions, styles, and weights,” Park said. “We feed all of that big data into the AI algorithms so each person can have an intervention system that works independently. It would be a totally automatic system.”
The team’s idea has advanced in a National Academy of Medicine healthy longevity competition, receiving one of 20 Catalyst Awards out of more than 500 ideas. For House, who earned a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering at Tech in 1995, the potential is powerful: “A wheelchair system that will assist veterans in decreasing risk for pressure injury will allow veterans to become less dependent on caregivers for pressure reduction strategies and allow for increased independence and self-determination.”
Park and Jayaraman will work over the next year to “ruggedize” their system for real-world use. They’re hoping to work with House to collect feedback and ideas from wheelchair users with spinal…
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