Engineering and design to enhance heart rate detection in cetacean-borne tags

Abstract

The proposed research will advance sensor technology and enhance signal-to-noise ratio of tag-measured heart rate signals infree-ranging cetaceans. Such an approach is needed to adequately assess the stress response associated with anthropogenic stimuli and acoustic disturbance. This proposal seeks funding to design and evaluate new digital electrocardiogram (ECG) loggers and to implement an engineering design process and technology transfer from previously successful tag deployments on pinnipeds (which yielded low noise, high-resolution EEG and ECG signals) to emergent tag designs for cetaceans. In particular, the design process and testing will focus on waterproofing electrodes from seawater, shielding electrodes from water flow, overall tag streamlining for reducing turbulence and vibration, and the electrical insulation of digital-ECG (dECG) recording electronics from electromagnetic noise from other animal-borne electronics. Together, all these efforts will reduce noise and enhance the detection of dECG signals. The optimization of dECG signals with improved tag design will facilitate field efforts that generate the data needed to monitor the baseline physiological processes of cetaceans and the changes in cardiac physiology that occur from acoustics disturbance.

Document Details

Document Type
DoD Grant Award
Publication Date
Jul 24, 2023
Source ID
N000142312561

Entities

People

  • Jeremy A. Goldbogen

Organizations

  • Office of Naval Research
  • Stanford University
  • United States Navy

Tags

Readers

  • Cardiovascular Physiology
  • Marine Mammal Biology
  • Software Engineering

Technology Areas

  • Microelectronics
  • Microelectronics - Microelectromechanical Systems