Biomedical Instrumentation and Control

History of biomedical engineering. Ethics, moral, regulations and guidelines related to biomedical and medical-technical research, clinical trials and animal trials. Medical research methodology.

Basic human anatomy and physiology with emphasis on muscles, nerves, digestion and endocrinology.

Instrumentation for weak bioelectric signals (EMG, ECG, EEG, etc.).

Electric safety issues related to biomedical measurements, diagnostics and treatment.

The body's own control systems. Examples of "homeostasis", feedback, feedforward, oscillations etc. in the body.

Examples of applications in prosthesis control and diabetes (glucose control).

Knowledge:

• Fundamental knowledge of the body’s anatomy and physiology, incl. main components and functions in the body’s organ systems.
• Fundamental knowledge of the history of medical-technical research and development.
• Fundamental knowledge of rules and guidelines related to medical-technical research and development (incl. ethical approval for clinical or animal studies).
• Good knowledge of electric safety in biomedical instrumentation.
• Fundamental knowledge of pharmacology and related topics.
• Fundamental knowledge of important control mechanisms in the body.
• Comprehensive knowledge of processes, functions and signals in selected organ systems (e.g., the muscular system, the nervous system and endocrinology).
• Fundamental knowledge of measurement principles and instrumentation relevant for different bioelectric signals of electric, chemical or mechanical nature (e.g., EMG, ECG, EEG, glucose sensing).
• Fundamental knowledge of noise and artifacts, as well as methods to minimize or mitigate this.

Skills:

• Discuss moral and ethical concerns in medical-technical research and development.
• Explain and analyse examples of control mechanisms in the human body.
• Apply bioelectric sensors and find suitable signal processing methods for such instrumentation.
• Develop essential parts of the signal processing in a control system based on bioelectric input signals.
• Analyse and evaluate electric safety in use of medical-technical equipment.
• Design and evaluate essential parts of a biomedical closed-loop control system.

General competence:

• Apply and evaluate principles of cybernetics and control engineering in biomedical applications.
• Communicate effectively about biomedical/medical-technical concepts and systems.

Lectures, mandatory assignments, mandatory lab. Some of these will be in English.