Respiration-Posture Feedback System for Breathing Control

We developed a respiration-posture feedback system to control breathing involuntarily. In this system, a rubber air chamber placed under a subject’s back inflates or deflates to adjust a subject’s chest position slightly. By adequately regulating the movement of this air chamber in synchrony with actual respiration, respiration was successfully lengthened and deepened, just like voluntary deep breathing. Moreover, the analysis of the heart rate signal indicated that the parasympathetic nervous system, which is a prominent nervous system in the body, was also activated. This respiration-posture feedback system can be used for an at home adaptive health care interface as part of an ambient system. The feedback regulation of respiration system could be a process like: 1. Respiratory centre in the brain initiates respiration. 2. Respiration induces changes in the pressure in the lung and pH in the blood. 3. These physiological changes are detected by mechanoreceptors and chemoreceptors, respectively. 4. The signal from each receptor is conveyed to the respiratory centre at the brain stem via the (afferent) parasympathetic nervous system. After step four start another time the same process.