Your Floor Knows Where You Are: Sensing and Acquisition of Movement Data

This paper describes the first results on a sensor floor, which can be integrated in home environments to assist old and frail persons living independently at home. The sensor floor works with a dense array of piezo elements. Its purpose is not only to monitor the inhabitant´s position within the room but also to analyze impact patterns for later activation of stable rescue procedures in case of fall or other emergency events. Algorithms were developed to gain information on steps of persons in the room from the piezo impulses. The sensors are invisibly integrated in the room´s floor, which is part of a living lab (the Future Care Lab) developed and built within the eHealth project at RWTH Aachen University.