Different sensors used in fitness trackers
Smartwatches with Fitness trackers have
become essential lifestyle devices that helps track how active you are along
with basic health parameters.
The smartwatches do a lot more than showing time, show
notifications on your wrist. They're everything in one: a fitness tracker, a
wallet, and in some cases, even making phone calls.
A smartwatch can also save your
life with elevated heart rate alerts and automatically connect you to emergency
services if you fall. Electrocardiogram (ECG) and blood oxygen (SpO2) readings
are perks of certain premium models, too. It still has a compass, fall
detection and GPS.
Following are the
different sensors used in fitness trackers:
Ambient light sensor: This sensor is also used in mobile devices to increase or
decrease the screen brightness, thus saving your battery life. This sensor
tweaks display brightness based on the surrounding light for better battery
life.
3 axis accelerometer: This is an electromechanical device that senses gravity, as well
as linear accelerations, detects movement, and tracks direction. This track's
forward and backward movement by sensing gravity and determine the body’s
orientation, position, and also rate of change of speed.
Altimeter: This
sensor uses atmospheric pressure to sense any changes in the altitude. Detects
Change in height, are you climbing stairs or going down to calculate calories
count.
Barometer : This measures and shows the atmospheric pressure, thus you can know
whether it is going to be sunny or rainy day.
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Optical heart rate: This sensor detects heartbeats per minute. The device with an
optical HR sensor calculates your heartbeat per minute using a special
algorithm. This sensor uses light to check the speed of blood flow on the
wrist. When the heartbeats, blood moves quickly inside thus less light is
reflected back to the sensor and is detected as a heartbeat
SpO2: This
sensor used to monitor and measure blood oxygen levels. It uses LEDs as a light
source to emit light into the tissue and a photodetector is used to collect the
light back from the skin and measure how well the oxygen is supplied to each
part of your body from your heart.
Bioimpedance sensor: This sensor is used in Smart weighing scales to measure your
body composition such as the total body fat w.r.t your lean body mass.
Proximity sensor : These sensors saves battery and wakes the display when needed. It helps in lowering the power consumption by
putting the device to sleep If you are not wearing the fitness tracker, this
sensor enables the device to sleep and save battery when not in use and turns
off display
Compass : It helps in direction
and Maps. It shows the direction of magnetic north and bearings from it. A
compass helps Map applications to run on a smartwatch and also gives the device
a sense of direction.
ECG sensor: This sensor is to detect the minute electrical impulse that your heart sends
out with every heartbeat This sensor detects this minute heart signal through
the electrodes on the wearable.
GPS : It works by tracking
your exact location while you are walking or running by calculating the
distance between series of GPS satellites. It helps in detecting how much you
are running, the location of wearable, and tracks your activity.
LTE : A LTE enabled device,
simply means that is has built-in mobile connection i.e., you can make/receive
calls directly from the device itself.
Gyroscope
: Used to detect motion . It is used with other sensors to determine whether
you are actually running or simply jogging.
UV sensor: It measures exposure to harmful sunlight. The UV sensor monitors the sunlight
and alerts when you’re absorbing dangerous UV radiation whether the sunlight
outdoors is harmful or not.
Magnetometer
: The sensor measures the magnetic field of the earth and can also be
used as a compass. Works along with the GPS and compass to determine the
exact coordinates of your location
Electrodermal activity sensor : It measure stress along with a heart rate tracker, ECG, and skin
temperature sensor. It detects small electrical changes in the sweat level of
your skin and helps you manage your stress.
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