When
most
people
think
of
wearables,
they
typically
think
of
wristband
monitors
and
smartwatches.
But
there’s
also
things
like
“smart
shirts,”
actual
garments
that
contain
sensors
for
heart
rate,
breathing,
and
motion.
Researchers
at
the
University
of
Waterloo
in
Ontario,
Canada,
recently
used
such
shirts
to
see
if
they
could
develop
an
algorithm
to
detect
early
signs
of
future
chronic
diseases.
They
first
studied
13
healthy
men
in
their
20’s
in
a
laboratory-based
fitness
program,
creating
metric
benchmarks.
The
men
then
wore
the
shirts
in
their
daily
lives
for
4
unsupervised
days.
They
found
that
the
fitness
characteristics
measured
during
daily
life
correlated
closely
with
those
set
during
the
laboratory
sessions,
and
by
combining
all
of
those
characteristics
based
they
were
able
to
create
what
researcher
Richard
Hughson
called
a
“meaningful
single
number
to
track
fitness.”
Early
detection
of
subtle
aerobic
system
impairments
could
help
tip
off
healthcare
providers
to
negative
changes
in
a
patient’s
health.
It
could
also
allow
patients
with
conditions
like
type
2
diabetes
and
chronic
obstructive
pulmonary
disease
to
constantly
monitor
their
own
fitness
and
disease
state.
Alexander
Wong,
an
artificial
intelligence
and
engineering
expert
at
Waterloo,
worked
with
Hughson,
a
kinesiology
professor
at
the
Schlegel-University
of
Waterloo
Research
Institute
for
Aging,
and
Thomas
Beltrame,
a
computing
expert
who
has
since
begun
working
at
the
University
of
Campinas
in
Brazil.
The
collaboration
was
key
to
developing
the
algorithm.
[Read
more]