Apple New Airpod is a wearable electronic device consists of a housing, an electrode carrier, a set of electrodes, a sensor circuit, and a switching circuit. Hence, the carrier remains connected to the housing. The electrodes remain positioned at various locations on the nonplanar surface. Besides, there is a switching circuit that is used to electrically connect subsets of one or more electrodes in the electrodes set to the sensor circuit.
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1. The wearable electronic device of claim 1:
It includes a processor that is used to communicate with the sensor circuit & the switching circuit.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 2:
Hence, you can find the processor configured in the first mode. The switching circuit is controlled to sequentially connect several subsets of one or more electrodes to the sensor circuit through the switching circuit. It can conduct measurements for every subset of one or more electrodes that remain connected to the sensor circuit.
In the second mode, the wearable device’s task is to control the switching circuit in order to connect the identified subset of one or more electrodes to the sensor circuit. Remember that these electrodes are used to acquire the measurement of the biosignal. Additionally, its task is to obtain the biosignal’s measurement to operate the sensor circuit. On the other hand, the sensor circuit remains connected to the identified subset of one or more electrodes.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 3:
Hence, the subset number has one subset of active electrodes and a second subset with reference electrodes. There is an optimized biosignal that is correlated to various pairs of an active electrode ( from the 1st subset), and a reference electrode ( from the 2nd subset) is produced once a respective weight will be applied to the 1st subset’s every active electrode and 2nd subset’s every reference electrode.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 1:
The sensor circuit includes a set of reference electrodes (1 or more than 1) disposed on the housing’s exterior surface.
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The wearable electronic device according to claim 1:
Hence, you can find a flexible circuit substrate in the electrode carrier. Otherwise, the electrode carrier includes an in-ear piece.
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The wearable electronic device according to claim 1:
Hence, the electrode carrier indicates a wall of the housing.
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The wearable electronic device according to claim 1:
An active or reference electrode will be present in one or more electrodes in the set of electrodes. In this case, you need to know about these types of electrodes disposed of on the electrode carrier.
- A wearable electronic device includes a housing, a set of active electrodes, a set of reference electrodes, and a switching circuit. These two types of electrodes are disposed of in the various housing regions of housing. You should know that the purpose of configuration for a switching circuit is to generate subsets of active electrodes where each one has at least one active electrode belonging to the set. In addition, it creates subsets of reference electrodes where each of them has at least one reference electrode of that set.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 9:
It comes with a processor that is configured to detect a subset of active electrodes set to sense a biosignal. Besides, it detects a subset of the reference electrode’s subset to sense the biosignal.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 10:
In this case, the identification process of one or more active electrodes’ subsets or one or more reference electrodes’ subsets comprises: choosing at least one active electrode from multiple electrodes depending on an analysis of impedances between the first electrode of active electrodes and the second electrode of reference electrodes. It relies on the physical distances between the first and the second electrode.
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The wearable electronic device according to claim 10:
Hence, the identification process of one or more active electrodes’ subsets comprises: choosing at least one active electrode from multiple active electrodes depending on the contact area with a body of a user for every set of active electrodes.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 10:
The processor is used to control the switching circuit to acquire measurements corresponding to the biosignal, which the active electrode’s subset senses.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 10:
You should know that the biosignal refers to an electrical activity of someone’s brain who is using it.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 9:
This electronic device is basically a wireless earbud or wired headphone device.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 9:
The housing has two regions — first and second. Hence, the set of active & reference electrodes is disposed of in the first and second regions, respectively.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 9:
At least one electrode of the active electrodes’ set comes in a ring shape, a circular shape, a dot shape, an oval shape, or a hybrid shape.
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The wearable electronic device of claim 9:
Hence, one electrode of the active electrodes’ set is coupled with another electrode belonging to the active electrodes’ set. Regarding the reference electrodes, an electrode is electrically coupled with another electrode via a flex or a set of micro axial cables.
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An apparatus configured for biosignal measurement:
This apparatus includes a first component that is designed to be worn on the first ear. Hence, the first component has a set of active electrodes, which are disposed of in various regions of the 1st component’s housing. For the second component, a set of reference electrodes will be disposed of in various areas of the second component’s housing.
Minimum one switching circuit remains electrically connected to a set of active & reference electrodes.
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The apparatus of claim 19:
There will be at least one processor which is configured to detect a subset of active electrodes or a subset of reference electrodes.
Background:
Electrodes help to monitor brain activity on the scalp of a user. Sometimes, these electrodes remain placed inside or around the outer ear. Due to the benefits like reduced device mobility, measuring brain activity using these electrodes are preferred. Additionally, it helps to decrease the visibility of the electrodes when you compare these to other models where electrodes need to be placed on visible areas around the scalp.
In order to measure brain activity accurately, people use an ear-electroencephalography (EEG) device. Hence, remember that the device should be customized for your ear, especially for concha, ear canal, Targus, etc. The intention is to let the electrodes (that are placed on the ear-EEG device) in touch with your body.
We all have different ear sizes and shapes. Besides, the ear size and shape change over time. For example, the ear canal can be changed over time. Sometimes, a customized ear-EEG device cannot generate accurate measurements. Moreover, a customized device can be costly too.
Summary:
All factors or aspects which are explained in this case are related to a wearable electronic device to measure your biosignal. This device has more electrodes than the number, which is essential for measuring biosignals. It can dynamically choose a subset of the electrodes to measure biosignals at a given time. It can even dynamically choose different subsets of electrodes to measure biosignals for various users.
Brief Description Of The Drawings:
You can see the reference that will be generated to representative aspects in the figures. Hence, you need to understand that the given descriptions do not limit this disclosure to an embodiment. Instead, the given disclosure covers alternatives, modifications, & equivalents because it is available within the spirit of described embodiments.
FIG. 1: It shows an instance of a wearable electronic device like an earbud.
FIG. 2: An wearable electronic device like an earbud is shown here with some embodiments.
FIG. 3: It shows a wearable electronic device’s single view of a portion with a few embodiments.
FIG. 4: This figure does the same as Figure 3.
FIG. 5: It shows a wearable electronic device like an earbud. A feature is enabled or disabled here to measure a biosignal with some embodiments.
FIG. 6: It shows an electrical block diagram where the electronic device has a few embodiments.
FIGS. 7A-7C: This figure shows several patterns of electrodes that are placed on the housing of a wearable electronic device.
FIG. 8: It displays a sensing circuit’s electrical block diagram of a wearable electronic device with some embodiments.
FIG. 9: This figure shows a choice of active electrodes with some embodiments.
FIG. 10: In this picture, you can see a wearable electronic device like a wired headset with some embodiments.
FIGS. 11A-11B: It shows views of biosignals that electrodes measure with some embodiments.
Detailed Description:
Embodiments are described which include a wearable electronic device like an earbud, a pair of earbuds, and a wired headset. The wearable electronic device features a housing along with some active & reference electrodes on the housing. The active & reference electrodes remain configured, which are useful for the measurement of the biosignal.
EEG or electroencephalography is the process through which wearable electronic devices measure biosignals. Other biosignals can be measured in a few embodiments, including electromyography (EMG), electrooculography (EOG), an electrocardiogram (ECG), a galvanic skin response (GSR), a blood volume pulse (BVP), etc.
You can use an earbud or wired headset, or other wearable electronic devices to measure a biosignal like an EEG, but it is necessary to place it inside the ear canal or around the ear so that active and reference electrodes remain in touch with the body at specific locations.
When any active or reference electrode is chosen to measure biosignals, it will dynamically reduce inaccuracies of the biosignal measurements in a few embodiments. Sometimes, the number of active and reference electrodes can be discreetly placed on the electronic device’s housing.
You can say in other words that every active and reference electrode can be disposed of in a housing’s various regions. Active and reference electrodes are seen to be connected in a few embodiments through a flex circuit substrate & micro axial cables. The electrode carrier can be an earpiece, such as an in-ear piece, an out-ear piece, or an over-ear piece, in some embodiments. In some embodiments, a set of flex circuit substrates or micro axial cables can be found.
Specification:
Active and reference electrodes which are chosen dynamically in some embodiments can be selected depending on the criteria like an impedance level, the physical distance between an active electrode & a reference electrode, half-cell potentials, noise (e.g., ambient noise, and/or electrode-skin interface noise, etc.), and so on.
Before starting the measuring process of a biosignal, it is important to choose one or more active electrodes to create a subset of active electrodes which belong to one or more subsets of active electrodes. And for the reference electrodes, it is also essential to choose one or more reference electrodes to form a subset of reference electrodes that belongs to one or more subsets of reference electrodes.
In a few embodiments, it is possible to update the subset of active or reference electrodes with the intention to add, update and remove an active or reference electrode from a subset of active or reference electrodes for measurement of biosignal.
You can see a few embodiments where a machine learning-based model is used to select one or more active and/or reference electrodes. The model can be configured to choose one or more active electrodes of the active electrode’s subset and a reference electrode from the reference electrode’s subset depending on some features, including an impedance level, noise, physical distance between an active & reference electrode, half-cell potentials, etc. This model will be based on multi-modal learning, supervised learning, and/or unsupervised learning approach.
Rather than choosing one or more active & reference electrodes in some embodiments, all active and reference electrodes are possibly chosen with the intention of measuring a biosignal. But one thing to remember is that every electrode of active or reference electrode can be assigned a different weight.
It is possible to determine the weights assigned to the active or reference electrodes’ electrodes depending on several factors including noise, impedance level, half-cell potential, placement of an electrode, etc. In addition, the weight assigned to every electrode can be determined relying on input data.
In a few embodiments, the EEG signal can be a biosignal that is measured using each active or reference electrode of the active or the reference electrodes sets, respectively. An EEG signal in a frequency band is an instance of a biosignal. When you close your eyes, the magnitude level of a raw signal corresponding to the electrode pair increases. After that, these will decrease once you open your eyes. It is possible to measure the magnitude level of the raw signal as a difference between (V_active) and (V_ref).
While (V_active) refers to the voltage measured at the active electrode, (V_ref) means a voltage measured at the reference electrode. Depending on the raw signal corresponding to every active and reference pair, obtaining their respective applied weight and an optimized signal in the frequency domain is possible.
This optimized signal that is corresponded to active and reference electrodes can appear as a single time-series signal. The creation of these signals depends on a respective weight assigned to these electrodes. It is possible to determine and assign their appropriate weight depending on performing different measurements.
In some embodiments, a switching circuit can form a subset of one or more active electrodes or all of them and/or the subset of reference electrodes or all of them. The switching circuit can electrically couple an electrode with another one. The circuit can be controlled using a processor, a microcontroller, a field-programmable gate array (FPGA), an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a digital signal processor (DSP), etc.
It is possible to couple the processor with one or more memories that can store instructions. Hence, the processor needs to perform instructions or execute an algorithm for choosing active or reference electrodes from their subsets. Along with this, the processor performs the measuring process using these electrodes based on the instructions. It is necessary to determine a respective weight value and assign them to every electrode.
We all know that all of us have different ear sizes and shapes, and we have different sizes of ear canals. Therefore, an active electrode with a predetermined position on the housing can generate a higher strength signal in one situation. However, creating a good-quality signal in another situation is impossible. Therefore, electrodes remain placed in different places on a customized wearable electronic device in different situations so that good sound quality can be obtained.
But these customized devices can be costly. To solve the problem, a number of active electrodes can be placed on the surface of a device’s housing. Besides, an electrode subset can be chosen to measure the biosignal for a given user at a given time, depending on some conditions. A switching circuit can be used to electrically couple the chosen subset(s) of electrodes. In this way, non-chosen electrodes are disabled to decrease the device’s energy consumption & improve the accuracy of the measurement.
In a few embodiments, several active electrodes can be disposed of in the wearable electronic device’s ear tip region. Whereas reference electrodes can be disposed of on the shell or earbud region outside of the ear canal. Based on a machine-learning model, one or more active electrodes can be selected, depending on the selection of active electrodes. Then, the chosen electrodes get coupled to the same channels with a switching circuit. Electrodes need to be placed in various ways or patterns. In addition, the electrodes can be chosen to create a pattern or a number of different patterns.
Some active electrodes are available in a circular shape, like a dot shape. The active electrodes can be placed around one or more concentric ring shapes. Disposing of active electrodes in one or more concentric rings at some distance apart is possible. The distance between different pairs of adjacent electrodes is different. One or more active electrodes from one or more concentric rings can be selected.
Several active electrodes with a hybrid shape can be seen in some embodiments. In other words it can be said that the electrodes have different shapes like circular, a part oval, a part square, and/or an undefined shape.
In a few embodiments, a specific electrode ring of active electrodes which are ring shaped can be chosen. Whereas in some embodiments, an active electrode is available in an oval shape. As a result, it can have a larger contact area with the user’s skin. A flex and/or a micro axial cable that connects the plurality of active and reference electrodes, might feature various geometries which can link the active electrodes. It is possible to shape flex and/or the micro axial cable as a spine, an octopus, and/or a mesh, etc. Remember that the chosen design for micro axial cable or flex relies on the wearable electronic device’s size. These cables can be embedded inside the device’s housing in some embodiments.
At least one ground (GND) connection along with the number of both kinds of electrodes can be found. In a few cases, the measurement starts when someone touches or taps on a reference electrode. A single reference electrode disposed on the shell can be seen in some embodiments. This single reference node might have any shape, like a circle, an oval, and/or a triangle, etc.
The device may come with a battery, amplifier, or a suitable power supply. There exists a voltage potential drop between active electrodes and corresponding reference electrodes. The voltage drop can be amplified using an amplifier. The positive and negative battery terminals remain connected to an amplifier that will give an electrical signal as a voltage and/or a current.
After that, with the help of an analog-to-digital converter, the amplified or non-amplified analog signal will be converted to a digital signal. Then, the digital signals need to be stored in the memory of the wearable electronic device. Besides, in a few cases, transmitting the digital signal from the measurement to the user equipment is possible.
Hence, a smartphone as user equipment can be used for transmission through Bluetooth, and/or Wi-Fi, etc. On the other hand, it is possible to transmit the measurements to a server using any radio access technology like 3G, 4G, 5G, 6G, Wi-Fi, WiMax, etc. The server stores it as historical data, and you can access this. Another person is able to access this also when they get permission. Thus, the biosignal measurement is used to inform users of different biosignal-driven use cases like sleep monitoring. Sometimes, a filter like a low-pass filter, or a bandpass filter is used for decreasing the noise levels.
Sometimes, it becomes essential to keep as much distance as possible between an active electrode and a corresponding reference electrode as much as possible. You should know that the active and reference electrodes can be disposed of on different earbuds. For instance, active electrodes can be placed on a right earbud whereas reference electrodes on the left one. After that, one processor & one switching circuit create a subset of active and reference electrodes to measure the biosignal.
Conclusion:
This article has elaborated on all the details that you need to know about the apple airpod. For further queries, you can ask us via comments.
