ECG: measure your heartbeat
Its pretty interesting to measure ones heart beat. A lot of fancy analog circuitry is needed for this. But fortunately there is a Arduino shield for this: the SHIELD-EKG-EMG from Olimex.
Hardware:
- EKG/EMG shield (price: ~24€), Manual: [[Link]](https://www.olimex.com/Products/Duino/Shields/SHIELD-EKG-EMG/resources/SHIELD-EKG-EMG-Revision-C.pdf)
- SHIELD-EKG-EMG-PA - passive electrode for SHIELD-EKG-EMG shield (price: ~12€)
- Olimexino-328 - Arduino Like Development Board (price: ~26€)
- some waterbased lube to improve conductivity with the electrodes
Software:
- Olimexino-Firmware: [[Link]](https://www.olimex.com/Products/Duino/Shields/SHIELD-EKG-EMG/resources/ShieldEkgEmgDemo.zip), be sure to also install the libraries (TimerOne, FlexiTimer2), see manual for more information
- visualisation software - ElectricGuru: [[Link]](https://www.olimex.com/Products/EEG/OpenEEG/EEG-SMT/resources/ElecGuru40.zip)
Preparation:
- OLIMEXINO-328: remove the wire between the R6 pads, this is important, otherwise you will damage your ecg-shield!
- SHIELD-EKG-EMG: jumper settings
- REF_E – closed
- 3.3V/5V – 5V position
- D4/D9 – D9 position
- ANI_SEL – 1 position (channel)
- connect the shield to the board
- connect OLIMEXINO-328 to the PC
- compile and upload the ShieldEkgEmgDemo.pde
- start the ElectricGuru software, open Preferences -> Serial Port, choose the Arduinos port; open Preferences -> Trace, select just channel 1 and maximize the height
- wire yourself to the electrodes: to your right arm, left arm and the DLR to your right leg
- connect the electrodes to the ECG-shield
- apply some lube to your arms and led between the electrodes and your skin
- ElectricGuru: click the Start EEG button
Results:
If the conductivity is bad, you might get a noisy image like this:
Otherwise, if everything works fine and you are still alive, it looks like this:
March 31, 2013