Automatic estimation of sleep level for nap based on conditional probability of sleep stages and an exponential smoothing method

An automatic sleep level estimation method was developed for monitoring and regulation of day time nap sleep. The recorded nap data is separated into continuous 5-second segments. Features are extracted from EEGs, EOGs and EMG. A parameter of sleep level is defined which is estimated based on the conditional probability of sleep stages. An exponential smoothing method is applied for the estimated sleep level. There were totally 12 healthy subjects, with an averaged age of 22 yeas old, participated into the experimental work. Comparing with sleep stage determination, the presented sleep level estimation method showed better performance for nap sleep interpretation. Real time monitoring and regulation of nap is realizable based on the developed technique.