Apparatus, system, and method for detecting physiological movement from audio and multimodal signals

Abstract

Methods and devices provide physiological movement detection with active sound generation. In some versions, a processor may detect breathing and/or gross body motion. The processor may control producing, via a speaker coupled to the processor, a sound signal in a user's vicinity. The processor may control sensing, via a microphone coupled to the processor, a reflected sound signal. This reflected sound signal is a reflection of the sound signal from the user. The processor may process the reflected sound, such as by a demodulation technique. The processor may detect breathing from the processed reflected sound signal. The sound signal may be produced as a series of tone pairs in a frame of slots or as a phase-continuous repeated waveform having changing frequencies (e.g., triangular or ramp sawtooth). Evaluation of detected movement information may determine sleep states or scoring, fatigue indications, subject recognition, chronic disease monitoring/prediction, and other output parameters.