M5 Newsletter: Engineering in Motion

Dear Reader,

This week’s senior design project highlight is very moving—literally. SDP Team 35 is bringing a major innovation to athletics: a 3D pose tracker and heart rate sensor for runners.

“When it comes to running, there is a large amount of form work needed, and it's hard to get a view of all angles of the body,” explained team member Aidan Chin.

Team 35 member Aidan Chin

While solutions to this problem exist, they are often either too expensive or too low in precision to be of much use for the average runner.

That’s where Team 35’s innovation comes in. Their design will include ten 9-axis inertial measurement units (IMUs) placed on key points of the wearer’s body. These IMUs feature an accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer, which together measure acceleration and rotation.

As integral to the project as they are, the IMUs also present the biggest challenge.

A larger IMU offers higher battery life, accuracy, and computing power than a smaller unit. However, choosing one that’s too large can create discomfort and hinder a runner’s performance. There’s also cost to consider. “With price, the sky’s the limit with IMUs,” says Aidan. Extremely accurate and powerful units can cost as much as $50,000. The team’s goal is to find a unit that produces data that’s “good enough” without driving up the price of the device.

There are plenty of fish to fry for Team 35.

“We need to build a prototype just to make sure everything works, and then we can order the PCBs and make everything smaller,” says Aidan. On top of the hardware, they plan to use AI to interpret the data, training it on information from professional athletes.

The road is indeed long to a finished product—but with determination, passion, and craft, Team 35 is sure to create something that will get your heart racing.