Simulation of RF biological tissues response towards remote sensing ECG device

Premature newborns are at high risk of developing infections, so they require continuous monitoring of vital parameters for long periods of time; approximately until they reach the pregnancy due date. Electrocardiogram (ECG) is one of the most widely used methods for evaluating the structure-function relationships of the heart in health and disease. Due to incomplete skin development, the very premature newborn has some special requirements to the ECG monitoring electrodes. Contact ECG monitoring has several disadvantages especially when used to them. Therefore, in order to design a new measurement method to assess contactless ECG monitoring, our thesis goal is to determine the feasibility of using RF for remote sensing ECG. This is achieved by studying the different mechanisms for interaction between radio frequency (RF) fields and biological tissues. The ECG current propagated from the heart through the skin has an effect on the permittivity of the skin which is frequency dependent. Thus, the feasibility of detecting the change of the relative permittivity in the presence of ECG signal is also discussed. In order to simplify our project, the RF biological tissues response is firstly simulated using MATLAB software.