Cooperative sensors: a new wired body-sensor-network approach for wearable biopotential measurement

Cooperative sensors are a novel measurement architecture based on active dry electrodes that allows the acquisition of biopotential signals (e.g., electrocardiogram, ECG) on patients in a comfortable and easy-to-integrate manner. This paper starts by analyzing the classical methods for measuring multilead ECG signals. Based on these classical methods, we then briefly introduce the concept of cooperative sensors and show how these sensors can be implemented in a wearable and reliable system that measures ECG signals in a real-life scenario. The main focus and innovation presented in this paper is on the duplex communication between the cooperative sensors. In addition, we show a first measurement of an ECG signal with cooperative sensors.