Classifications

• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A61—MEDICAL OR VETERINARY SCIENCE; HYGIENE
  • A61B—DIAGNOSIS; SURGERY; IDENTIFICATION
  • A61B3/00—Apparatus for testing the eyes; Instruments for examining the eyes
  • A61B3/10—Objective types, i.e. instruments for examining the eyes independent of the patients' perceptions or reactions
  • A61B3/113—Objective types, i.e. instruments for examining the eyes independent of the patients' perceptions or reactions for determining or recording eye movement
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A61—MEDICAL OR VETERINARY SCIENCE; HYGIENE
  • A61B—DIAGNOSIS; SURGERY; IDENTIFICATION
  • A61B5/00—Measuring for diagnostic purposes; Identification of persons
  • A61B5/16—Devices for psychotechnics; Testing reaction times ; Devices for evaluating the psychological state
  • A61B5/163—Devices for psychotechnics; Testing reaction times ; Devices for evaluating the psychological state by tracking eye movement, gaze, or pupil change
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A61—MEDICAL OR VETERINARY SCIENCE; HYGIENE
  • A61B—DIAGNOSIS; SURGERY; IDENTIFICATION
  • A61B5/00—Measuring for diagnostic purposes; Identification of persons
  • A61B5/16—Devices for psychotechnics; Testing reaction times ; Devices for evaluating the psychological state
  • A61B5/18—Devices for psychotechnics; Testing reaction times ; Devices for evaluating the psychological state for vehicle drivers or machine operators
• • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
  • B60—VEHICLES IN GENERAL
  • B60K—ARRANGEMENT OR MOUNTING OF PROPULSION UNITS OR OF TRANSMISSIONS IN VEHICLES; ARRANGEMENT OR MOUNTING OF PLURAL DIVERSE PRIME-MOVERS IN VEHICLES; AUXILIARY DRIVES FOR VEHICLES; INSTRUMENTATION OR DASHBOARDS FOR VEHICLES; ARRANGEMENTS IN CONNECTION WITH COOLING, AIR INTAKE, GAS EXHAUST OR FUEL SUPPLY OF PROPULSION UNITS IN VEHICLES
  • B60K28/00—Safety devices for propulsion-unit control, specially adapted for, or arranged in, vehicles, e.g. preventing fuel supply or ignition in the event of potentially dangerous conditions
  • B60K28/02—Safety devices for propulsion-unit control, specially adapted for, or arranged in, vehicles, e.g. preventing fuel supply or ignition in the event of potentially dangerous conditions responsive to conditions relating to the driver
  • B60K28/06—Safety devices for propulsion-unit control, specially adapted for, or arranged in, vehicles, e.g. preventing fuel supply or ignition in the event of potentially dangerous conditions responsive to conditions relating to the driver responsive to incapacity of driver
  • B60K28/066—Safety devices for propulsion-unit control, specially adapted for, or arranged in, vehicles, e.g. preventing fuel supply or ignition in the event of potentially dangerous conditions responsive to conditions relating to the driver responsive to incapacity of driver actuating a signalling device
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
  • G06V—IMAGE OR VIDEO RECOGNITION OR UNDERSTANDING
  • G06V20/00—Scenes; Scene-specific elements
  • G06V20/50—Context or environment of the image
  • G06V20/59—Context or environment of the image inside of a vehicle, e.g. relating to seat occupancy, driver state or inner lighting conditions
  • G06V20/597—Recognising the driver's state or behaviour, e.g. attention or drowsiness
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
  • G06V—IMAGE OR VIDEO RECOGNITION OR UNDERSTANDING
  • G06V40/00—Recognition of biometric, human-related or animal-related patterns in image or video data
  • G06V40/10—Human or animal bodies, e.g. vehicle occupants or pedestrians; Body parts, e.g. hands
  • G06V40/18—Eye characteristics, e.g. of the iris
  • G06V40/19—Sensors therefor
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G08—SIGNALLING
  • G08B—SIGNALLING OR CALLING SYSTEMS; ORDER TELEGRAPHS; ALARM SYSTEMS
  • G08B21/00—Alarms responsive to a single specified undesired or abnormal condition and not otherwise provided for
  • G08B21/02—Alarms for ensuring the safety of persons
  • G08B21/06—Alarms for ensuring the safety of persons indicating a condition of sleep, e.g. anti-dozing alarms

Definitions

• This invention relates to the field of cognitive systems. More precisely, this invention pertains to the field of detecting a level of vigilance of an individual.
• EEG Electroencephalogram
• an apparatus for generating an indication of a level of vigilance of an individual comprising a gaze acquisition unit providing a gaze data stream of at least one eye of the individual, a processing unit receiving the gaze data stream and using the gaze data stream to determine the indication of the level of vigilance and a data providing unit receiving and providing the indication of the level of vigilance.
• a method for generating an indication of a level of vigilance of an individual comprising acquiring a plurality of gaze directions of the individual, analyzing the acquired plurality of gaze directions of the individual to determine a gaze pattern and generating an indication of the level of vigilance using the gaze pattern.
• a method for predicting drowsiness of an individual comprising acquiring a plurality of gaze 'directions of the individual, analyzing the acquired plurality of gaze directions of the individual to determine a gaze pattern, generating an indication of the level of vigilance using the gaze pattern and providing an indication of drowsiness of the individual using the indication of said level of vigilance.
• Fig. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of an apparatus which uses an indication of a level of vigilance of an individual;
• Fig. 2 is a flowchart showing an embodiment wherein an action is performed according to an indication of a level of vigilance
• Fig. 3 is a flowchart showing how a plurality of gaze directions of an individual is acquired
• Fig. 4 is a flowchart showing how the plurality of gaze directions of the individual is analyzed in order to provide a gaze pattern
• Fig. 5 is a flowchart showing how an indication of a level of vigilance is generated using the pattern. - A -
• drowsiness also referred to as sleepiness
• sleepiness may be found in Santamaria and Chiappa "The EEG of Drowsiness in Normal Adults" Journal of Clinical Neurophysiology", 4, 4, 1987, pp327-379. Sleepiness is also referred to as "level 0.5” by Wright in “Vigilance on the civil flight deck: Incidence of sleepiness and sleep during long-haul flights and associated changes in physiological parameters” Ergonomics, 44, 1, 82 (25p) . While each of the two last references discloses a definition of sleepiness, it should be understood that the definition of "sleepiness” should not be limited to these definitions and the skilled addressee will appreciate that other definitions of sleepiness may be found in the pertinent literature. This description is intended to encompass all such definitions.
• FIG. 1 there is shown an embodiment of an apparatus 8 which uses an indication of a level of vigilance of an individual.
• the apparatus 8 comprises an image acquisition unit 10 which is an embodiment of a gaze acquisition unit, a processing unit 12, a data providing unit 14, a user interface 16 and a memory unit 18.
• the image acquisition unit 10 is adapted to provide an image data stream signal which is an embodiment of a gaze data stream.
• the image data stream signal comprises a plurality of timely-spaced images of an individual. More precisely, the timely-spaced images comprise at least the eyes of the individual. It has been contemplated that the timely-spaced images may comprise images of only one of the eyes of the individual.
• the image acquisition unit 10 is a digital black and white image acquisition unit further having infra-red sensors in order to detect the eyes of the individual by day or night.
• the image acquisition unit 10 preferably provides a resulting image which results from the subtraction of a bright image from a dark image.
• the processing unit 12 is adapted to provide an indication of a level of vigilance of the individual using the image data stream signal provided by the image acquisition unit 10 and further using a data signal to retrieve provided by the memory unit 18.
• the processing unit 12 is further adapted to provide a data signal to store to the memory unit 18.
• the processing unit 12 is selected from the group consisting of field programmable gate arrays (FPGA), processors, microcontrollers, dedicated circuits or the like.
• the data providing unit 14 r-eceives the indication of a level of vigilance and provides a detection signal to provide to the user interface 16.
• the user interface 16 is adapted to provide a signal to an individual (or to another entity as discussed below) according to the detection signal to provide to the user interface 16.
• the signal may be a sensorial data which is selected from a group consisting of visual signals, acoustic signals, stimulation signals and motion signals.
• the user interface 16 may therefore comprise for instance a sound providing unit, a display unit, a motion providing unit, a cell phone, etc.
• existing user interfaces providing information to the individual such as LCD screen display in car, car navigation console, etc may be advantageously used in order to provide the signal to the individual.
• the memory unit 18 is adapted for storing a data signal to store and further to provide the data signal to retrieve as explained below. ,
• FIG. 2 there is shown how an action is performed according to a generated indication of a level of vigilance. s
• a plurality of gaze directions of the individual is acquired.
• the plurality of gaze directions is acquired using the image acquisition unit 10.
• FIG. 3 there is shown how the plurality of gaze directions of the individual is acquired.
• an image is acquired with an indication of a temporal location.
• the image is acquired using the image acquisition unit 10.
• the image acquired is preferably the resulting image from a subtraction of a bright image (in which the pupil of an eye will be white) of the individual from a dark image of the individual (in which the pupil of the eye of the individual will be black) .
• a bright image in which the pupil of an eye will be white
• a dark image of the individual in which the pupil of the eye of the individual will be black
• the position of the eyes, relative to the individual ' s head is detected in the acquired image.
• the position of the eyes of the individual is detected by the processing unit 12. More precisely, the position of the eyes is detected using a Kalman algorithm for detecting the pupil of the eye as disclosed in "Lips and face real time tracker", Conference on computer vision and pattern recognition, by Olivier, Pentland and Berard in Puerto Rico, June 1997, pp 123-129. It should be appreciated that upon detection of the position of the eyes, an X coordinate and a Y coordinate are associated to each eye for identifying uniquely the position of each eye.
• step 34 the position of the eyes is provided with the corresponding indication of a temporal location.
• the position of the eyes is provided in a memory not shown in Figure 1.
• the acquired plurality of gaze directions of the individual is analyzed to provide a gaze pattern.
• FIG. 4 there is shown how the acquired plurality of gaze directions of the individual is analyzed.
• step 40 the position of the eyes in the image is provided with the time indication.
• an eye fixation position is determined using the position of the eyes and the time indication.
• the eye fixation position is determined using the processing unit 12.
• a moving frequency between two eye positions is determined using the processing unit 12.
• a gaze pattern is created using the determined eye fixation and the determined moving frequency.
• an indication of a level of vigilance is generated using the created gaze pattern.
• Fig. 5 there is shown how the indication of a level of vigilance is generated using the created pattern.
• the created pattern is compared to existing patterns.
• a plurality of existing patterns is stored in the memory unit 18.
• Each existing patterns is related to a level of vigilance.
• the amount of alpha frequencies which may be measured using an EEG
• the eye fixation position is concentrated roughly in one point and a reduction in saccade length is observed.
• the eyes fixation positions become more structured, the frequency of the eye fixation decreases while the duration of an eye fixation position increases. It is therefore possible to relate a level of vigilance of the individual to a workload allocated to the individual and further to the gaze pattern of the individual.
• an indication of a level of vigilance is determined using the result of the comparison of the gaze pattern of the individual with the plurality of existing patterns.
• the indication of a level of vigilance is determined using the processing unit 12. More precisely, the level of vigilance is selected using the corresponding level of vigilance for each of the existing patterns which are found to be close, as a result to the comparison performed in step 50, to the existing pattern for the individual.
• An interpolation may be performed using more than one corresponding level of vigilance.
• an indication of a level of vigilance for the individual is provided, it should be also understood by the skilled addressee that an indication of a variation of the level of vigilance for the individual may also be provided. Also the skilled addressee will appreciate that the indication of a level vigilance is preferably provided together with an indication of a corresponding temporal location which is not shown in Fig. 1 for clarity purposes.
• the determined indication of a level of vigilance is provided to the data providing unit. It should be also understood that the determined indication of a level of vigilance may also be provided to the memory unit 18 with a corresponding gaze data stream pattern.
• an action is performed according to the generated indication of a level of vigilance.
• the action depends on various criteria such as an application sought, a level of vigilance, a variation in the level of vigilance, etc.
• a first given threshold may be provided for a level of vigilance or a second given threshold may be provided for a variation of the level of vigilance.
• an information signal may be provided in the case where the variation in the level of vigilance reaches the second given threshold or when the indication of a level of vigilance becomes lower than the first given threshold.
• the information signal may comprise an alarm signal.
• the action is performed via the user interface 16 of the individual. Alternatively, the action may be performed at a remote location.
• the apparatus for generating an indication of a level of vigilance of the individual comprises a gaze acquisition unit providing a gaze data stream of at least one eye of said individual, a processing unit receiving and using the provided gaze data stream to generate an indication of the level of vigilance and a data providing unit receiving and providing the indication of the level of vigilance.
• the gaze acquisition unit is preferably an image acquisition unit.
• the processing unit is using the received gaze data stream over time with a formulae in order to generate the indication of the level of vigilance. Such formulae is disclosed in "A new method for describing search patterns and quantifying visual load using eye movement data" by Chia-Fen Chi and Fang- Tsan Lin, International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics 19 (1997) 249-257, hereby incorporated by reference.
• Such method and apparatus enable the detection of early stages of drowsiness (sleep stages); i.e., enable the prediction of drowsiness. Enabling such prediction is of great advantage as proper measures may be implemented in order to avoid potential fatal errors that may happen in later stages of drowsiness.
• the method and apparatus may also be used in order to monitor an evolution in time of a level of vigilance and may therefore be used in order to provide information indicative of remaining cognitive resources of the individual. The information indicative of the remaining cognitive resources may then be related to an indication of a risk of incident/accident. It should be then understood that various alert signals may then be provided to the individual.
• the individual may also receive information/suggestions suitable to the indication of vigilance such as stopping a car for instance. Also an operator may also receive the information concerning the individual in order take necessary measures at a larger scale.
• the data providing unit 14 provides a detection signal to the user interface 16
• the detection signal may be provided to a remote location using at least one of a body area network (BAN) , a local area network (LAN) , a metropolitan area network (MAN) and a wide area network (WAN) .
• BAN body area network
• LAN local area network
• MAN metropolitan area network
• WAN wide area network
• the preferred embodiments are provided by a combination of hardware and software components, with some components being implemented by a given function or operation of a hardware or software system, and many of the data paths illustrated being implemented by data communication within a computer application or operating system. The structure illustrated is thus provided for efficiency of teaching the present preferred embodiment.
• the present invention can be carried out as a method, can be embodied in a system, a computer readable medium or an electrical or electro- magnetical signal.

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• Combustion & Propulsion (AREA)
• Eye Examination Apparatus (AREA)
• Measurement Of The Respiration, Hearing Ability, Form, And Blood Characteristics Of Living Organisms (AREA)
• Road Signs Or Road Markings (AREA)
• Management, Administration, Business Operations System, And Electronic Commerce (AREA)
• Manufacture, Treatment Of Glass Fibers (AREA)

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• 2004
  • 2004-09-13 US US10/938,663 patent/US7435227B2/en not_active Expired - Fee Related
• 2005
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  • 2005-09-08 CN CNA2005800307428A patent/CN101035463A/zh active Pending
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