Recent advances on wearable electronics and embedded computing systems for biomedical applications

The application of wearable electronics in the biomedical research and commercial fields has been gaining great interest over the last several decades. Small-sized, lightweight monitoring systems with low-power consumption and, of course, wearability allow for the collection of physiological and behavioral data in ecological scenarios (e.g., at home, during daily activities or sleep, during specific tasks, etc.) with a minimal discomfort for the end user [1]. As a result, outpatient-monitoring care can be associated with improved quality of life, especially for patients with chronic disease, possibly preventing unnecessary hospitalizations and reducing direct and indirect healthcare costs. To this extent, research efforts have been focusing on the development of innovative sensors (e.g., smart-textile or contactless electrodes) and sensing platforms, as well as effective algorithms for embedded signal processing and data mining. Furthermore, significant endeavors have been related to small-scale integration of analog/digital sensor signal conditioning and energy harvesting, especially in the case of wireless body area/sensor networks. The high impact of wearable technology in the frame of multidisciplinary scientific research is also confirmed by the significant number of studies published throughout the last several decades. By searching the keywords “wearable”, “monitoring”, and “human” in the Scopus database, taking into account article title, abstract, and keywords, a total of 2531 entries have been found, starting with less than 10 articles per year before 2001 and reaching more than 200 articles per year since 2011.