Automated distance evaluation for pulse wave velocity estimation.

The aim of this thesis work is to design a system for the automatic distance measurement for the estimation of pulse wave velocity (PWV). For this purpose, the basic principles of time delay estimation (TDE) are exploited, specifically the time of arrival (TOA) of sound signal. The thesis is structured with a background chapter which presents the state of art and the current techniques for the assessments of the PWV’s distance. In the second chapter, the methods for the distance evaluation were studied and analysed to investigate problems related to this measurement, and to approximate at better the non-linear shape of vessels. The third chapter presents the system’s hardware and firmware implementation, detailing the circuit adopted to emit a sound wave by a speaker and to detect it by a microphone. Finally, the last chapters show algorithms based on the amplitude and frequency modulation, which are used to evaluate time delay and according to sound velocity the distance.