ON-LINE ALERTNESS MONITOR

DESCRIPTION: (Applicant's abstract): Inappropriate sleepiness during waking hours is a frequent concomitant of clinical sleep disorders and common lifestyle factors. Functionally, sleepiness is associated with difficulties in concentrating, sustaining attention and remembering recent events, and produces behavioral slowing. These impairments cause chronic reductions in productivity at work, at home, or in school, and can result in tragic accidents. Systematic research into the functional consequences of problem sleepiness is hindered by a lack of effective methods for monitoring alertness continuously and over extended periods of time in individuals performing naturalistic tasks such as working at a computer. Recent technological and scientific advances provide the basis for the proposed development of a self-contained neurophysiological signal acquisition and processing system, the On-line Alertness Monitor (OLAM). The OLAM will continuously record and analyze EEG signals, applying advanced signal decontamination and classification functions to derive on-line estimates of sleepiness from individuals engaged in computer-based work. In the Phase I project we propose to determine the feasibility of the key remaining scientific and signal processing issues for the OLAM. If feasiblity is established in Phase I, we will propose to design, implement and test a prototype system during Phase II, and commercialize the system during Phase III. PROPOSED COMMERCIAL APPLICATION: Excessive daytime sleepiness has been estimated to affect up to 5% of the population and is on the increase. EDS has profound societal costs in the form of tragic accidents and reduced productivity. The first generation OLAM would be marketed to researchers as an enabling technology to objectively evaluate the impact that EDS has on computer-based work including simulated vehicle operation. This would lead to the development of low-cost second-generation devices for clinical assessment and alertness monitoring in individuals. The market for the first generation device is sufficient to sustain the product, and there is a larger potential market for the second-generation device.