SMART CLOTHES FOR THE MONITORING IN REAL TIME AND
CONDITIONS OF PHYSIOLOGICAL, EMOTIONAL AND SENSORIAL
REACTIONS OF HUMAN
F. Axisa1, A. Dittmar1, G. Delhomme1,.
1
Microcapteurs et Microsystèmes Biomédicaux, INSA Lyon, Bât. Léonard de Vinci, CNRS LPM, 20 Av. Einstein,
69621 Villeurbanne Cedex, France, Tel : +33 (0)4 72 43 89 86, Fax : + 33 (0)4 72 43 89 87, dittmar@univ-lyon1.fr
Abstract- The world is becoming more and more "health
conscious" and there is an important need for the
improvement of the quality of health in medicine.
Home care, ambulatory measurements, permanent
monitoring are well-convenient for this purpose.
For a citizen use, these devices have to be user-friendly.
Smart clothes and gloves fit well for a citizen use due to their
main characteristics: They avoid and/or they simplify the
setting of sensors and they enable normal and daily
activities.
Marsian is composed of four elements:
- A “smart tee shirt” (EKG, Rib cage and abdominal
respiration measurement, Core temperature, body heat
flow),
- A “smart glove” (Skin potential and conductance, skin
temperature),
- A wrist device (amplification, wireless data transmission)
- A data logger ( continuous recording)
All the sensors are non invasive. Marsian can be used for the
measurement of the autonomous nervous system activity,
which provides information upon the emotional, sensorial,,
intellectual and task reactions.
The methodology has been already used for the study of the
driver’s reactions in real conditions, for the study of smell,
taste, touch and thermal comfort ( heat and air velocity)
reaction, for sport activities, for the optimization for
movement’s programming and mental imaging.
the integration of sensors and actuators in the fabric frame
and provide light and user—friendly electronic systems
Fibres can also have an active role in sensing or
communicating, as it self or in a network. Almost every
kind of fibres can be woven or embroidered, like optic
fibres, carbon fibres or polymer fibres. An example of
technology is in Figure 1, are stainless steal wires woven
in fabrics and used as bus in the VTAMN project [1] and
Wealthy project [2]. Woven sensors, micro sensors and
microsystems can be easily included in textiles due to
their small size or their flexibility.
I. INTRODUCTION
2) Smart Clothes and systems
Smart bio communicative clothes and textiles will
play an active role in ambulatory measurements and
monitoring as a device itself. Communication can be
provided by GPS, radio, screen, keyboard, camera,
speaker or phone integrated in the cloth. Biomedical smart
clothes use those facilities with a network of embedded
sensors to measure and monitor non invasively the vital
and behavioural parameters of human.
MARSIAN is composed of a smart gloves and of
atee-shirt which measure the activity of the autonomic
nervous system to study physiological, emotional and
sensorial parameters of human
The World is becoming more and more ‘health
conscious’, and expects from health care more and more
security and efficiency. In hospital, the level of quality
increases, new technologies provides more efficiency at
cheapest cost, and sterility level is getting higher and
higher. Moreover development of home care is a chance
to increase the quality and the efficiency of health care. In
order to reach such a goal, ambulatory measurement,
monitoring devices, user-friendly devices, and non
invasive and painless devices should be more and more
developed.
Textile is playing a great role in such development. At
first, about 90% of the skin can be in contact with textile
which is the main interface to body. Then fabrics are
flexible and fit well with human body. Moreover fabrics
are cheap and disposable. Last, integration of system into
textile is now possible.
1) Integrated system in clothes and textiles
Chemistry provides new fibres with new mechanical,
optical, or electrical properties. Micro technologies enable
Fig 1 : Stainless steal wires woven in fabric and used as bus for
electronic system.
II. METHODOLOGY
This methodology provides a way to analyse
emotional, vigilance and sensorial responses by
measuring the physiological responses of the autonomic
responses system. The autonomic nervous system (ANS)
is a non conscious nervous system which control and
feedback all the organs in order to adapt to the
environment and obtain homeostasis. Two opposite subsystems can control all the organs: the sympathic and
description of the intensity of the REDc responses. The
diagramme in figure 5 is an algorithm which extracts from
the intensity of the parameters variation the emotion due
to the stimulation. This analysis should be done by expert
system.
ANS
Responses
Tonic
Slope
Slope
duration
Measurement
methodology
Fig 4: Example of pattern analysis for neurovegetative analysis: On the
SC parameters, without stimulation, resistance is increasing with a
regular slope that determines the tonic SC response. After stimulation
resistance drops and came back to a regular slope after few oscillations.
Duration of oscillations (DPO) is a description of the phasic response of
REDc (A.Dittmar E.Vernet-Maury).
SkinBloodFlow
SkinResistance
Skin Temperature
Skin Potential
Fig 2 : Electro dermal and thermo vascular non invasive sensors on the
palm of the hand to measure the activity of the ANS.
According to Ekman P., Levenson R., Friesen W.V
[16], the ANS activity distinguishes among basics
emotions, which are for Ekman anger, disgust, fear,
sadness, surprise and joy. Each emotion has a specific
ANS responses (Ekman, Levenson & Friesen, 1983;
Levenson, Ekman & Friesen, 1990; Collet, VerneyMaury, Delhomme & Dittmar, 1997).The neurovegetative
analysis is based on the variation of each of ANS
parameters (SP, SC, SBF, ST, IHR, IRR). Those signals
have significant patterns and variations which can be
analyzed in order to extract emotional and sensorial
information.
Skin
temperature
Tonic
Phasic
SC in resitance
parasympathic one. The sympathic system enable the
body to react to emergency situation, increase heart beat,
blood pressure, muscle irrigation, finger sweating . The
parasympathic system is opposite and allow rest, heart
beat decreasing, digestion. As all the organs are controlled
by ANS and as skin is also an organ, we can get
information upon ANS activity using non invasive skin
sensors.
Four skin physiological neurovegetative parameters
are collected: Skin potential (SC), skin conductance (SC),
skin temperature (ST) and skin blood flow (SBF) (using
Hematron sensor), Instantaneous Respiration rate (IRR)
,movement of rib cage and abdomen using
plethysmography, instantaneous heart rate (IHR) can also
be monitored using non invasive sensors.
1min
Skin
Resistance
+ ++ ++ +
++
+ +
+++
Skin
resistance
Fig 3: ANS parameters variations for odour stimulation. SP and SC (here
shown as skin resistance) modification are particularly visible. Just after
the stimulation SC increase (Resistance decrease) as SP. Thermo
vascular parameters have also typical reactions.
Each parameter can be analysed in term of phasic and
tonic response (fig 4). The phasic one is a response to
stimulation and the tonic one is a response to a general
state of mind, like vigilance or comfort. For each
parameter we can extract indices which reflect the
intensity of the responses: duration of oscillations is a
DISGUST
SADNESS
FEAR
SURPRISE
+
HAPPINESS
++
+
-+
-+
+
++
+
-+
+++
++
+
+
Skin
Potential + +
Skin
Blood
Flow
+
+
++
Skin
Temperature
Fig 5 : Diagramme to extract emotion information from the
variations and patterns of ANS parameters. It is used for the
neurovegetative emotional analysis.
neurovegetative analysis :
Emotionnal response for odor stimuli
% of emotion response
Heart beat
+
+
ANGER
++ ++ ++
Skin potential
Skin blood
flow
++ ++ ++
Heart
Beat
+
+
+
Skin
Temperature
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Vanilla
Menthol
Eugenol
Ang
Dis
Fea
Sad
Sur
Joy
quantitative Analysis according to
Eckman Emotion System
Figure 6: Emotional analysis result from neurovegetative analysis. Three
odours were submitted to the subjects, vanilla, menthol and eugenol :
Vanilla induce an emotion composed of about 80% of Joy and 20% of
Surprise, but eugenol produces also Angry and Disgust. Menthol
produces also Fear and Sadness
This methodology has been already used to analyze
reaction to odour, taste stimulus, to analyze vigilance in
difficult tasks, to enhance mental imagery in sports
activity. Figure 6 is neurovegetative emotional analysis of
three odours. Neurovegetative emotional analysis
provides a blueprint of odours and the impact of them on
humans.
integrates plethysmographics sensors for the rib cage and
abdominal sensors, on which electrodes (woven stainless
steal, silver electrodes,..) for EKG can be implemented.
III. THE “MARSIAN” SYSTEM
MARSIAN (Modular Autonomous Recorder System
for the measurement of Autonomic Nervous system
activity) is an ambulatory measurement and monitoring
portable system designed for the evaluation of emotional
and sensorial reactions, especially in case of thermal
comfort and discomfort (figure 7). It is composed of four
elements:
- A smart glove which integrates skin sensors.
- A smart shirt which integrates EKG
electrodes and respiration sensors.
- A wrist system which collects data, process
them
and
provides
a
wireless
communication system.
- A data logger, or PC which records data and
provides analysis algorithm.
Fig 8 : Smart glove of MARSIAN with electrodes on palm view and
connector on back view
SENSORS
AMPLI.
Analog
To
Digital
Micro
Computer
Wireless
Transmission
ANALYSIS
Expert
System
Data
Process
Data
collection
Fig 9 : Structure of MARSIAN ((Modular Autonomous Recorder
System for the measurement of Autonomic Nervous system activity)
which grab signal from ANS Sensors and provide an analysis support for
the experts.
Fig 7 : MARSIAN Smart glove and wrist device.
Smart glove and smart shirt use textiles with
sensors and wires for communication, to provide userfriendly sensors setting, to enable the subject movement’s
autonomy without spoiling monitoring and to ensure the
ergonomic of the system.
The smart glove (figure 8) is a cames glove with the
less fabric possible to ensure mechanical function but not
to interfere with the hand skin physiology. Electrodes
Ag/AgCl (CLARK ELECTRODERMAL INSTRUMENTS, 30
mm²) are stuck to the fabric with silicon on finger location
glue as well as a thermistance BETACurve10K3A1 on the
palm. In order to have a interface gel, some solutions are
still on research.
Marsian includes non invasive skin sensors of skin
temperature, skin blood flow, skin electrical conductance
and skinl potential. Marsian includes also heart rate sensor
and respiration sensors on a smart shirt. The smart shirt is
a Visuresp™ tee-shirt (RBI,FRANCE) or a Wealthy shirt
[2] or a Lifeshirt™ (Vivometrics,USA) which already
Wrist device and data logger are designed to process,
to record and to transmit data in a user-friendly way.
Wireless communication and micro technologies are used
to ensure a good ergonomic and autonomy of the system.
The system doesn’t disturb the subject, and is well
convenient to provide a ‘real image’ of the patient’s
health. The wrist device is a motherboard which integrates
power supply from Lithium battery, a low noise and low
consumption amplification stage, an 18bit 
analog/digital converter, a microcontroller stage and an
RF emission stage (Figure 9)..
Fig 10 : Smart shirt from RBI,
FRANCE, called Visuresp™,
which includes plethysmographic
sensors for rib cage and
abdominal respiration
Features of the wrist device are : data acquisition and
treatment, cable or RF link with the data logger, several
type power supply mode and event marker to enable real
conditions experimentations.
Last, the PC and data logger grab data and process
them to record and enable analysis using an expert
system. This software has a modular data treatment
system to enable research in neuropsychological sciences.
IV.CONCLUSION
The autonomic nervous system activities (non
conscious) in real and ambulatory conditions are related
to the emotional, sensorial and cognitive responses and
activities.
Marsian is an hybrid device associating the advantages
and the specificity of smart clothes and of wrist devices.
Research is now focusing on smart clothes solutions to
enhance the use and the reliability of sensors.
Experimentation with MARSIAN has been already
done. The results have the same quality than laboratory
standard device already developed and tested by
A.Dittmar and G.Delhomme (CNRS LPM, INSA Lyon,
France).
Ergonomic of the software has been also enhanced to
enable user-friendly applications and experimentations.
The non invasive multiparametric measurements
carried out by Marsian have a large field of applications
and researches.
Main research topics are:
 Vigilance level and task related response
(cognitive and physical),
 Response to odour, taste, touch, vision(shape,
colour …), sound (speech …),
 Research on thermal and environmental comfort
responses and states
 Comparison with conscious and verbal
indications,
 Study in real conditions of the action
programming in sport,
 Mental imagery training and study for sport
 Study of behaviour and stress.
Moreover, in order to get an index or a decision tree to
determine ANS response in thermal comfort, research are
all also focused on subject responses in comfort or not in
various temperature, humidity and air velocity conditions
REFERENCES
PROJECT :
[1]
VTAMN Project: "Bioclothes For ambulatory
telemonitoring" (Vétement de Téléassistance Médicale
Nomade), RNTS 2000, French Ministry of Research and new
Technologies (France).
[2] Wealthy Project: Wearable Health Care System, IST 2001 –
3778, Commission of the European Communities,
http://www.wealthy-ist.com .
[5] CNRS programme : "Smart Sensors, Clothes and Houses in
Health", (Action Spécifique du Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique, 2002, France, "Capteurs, Vêtements et Habitats
Intelligents en la Santé").
[6] RBI : Visuresp Device, rbi.sarl@wanadoo.fr, France
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