App for diagnosing Parkinson's disease – The AUTH team in the top12 worldwide – Among the 12 best student innovation teams in the world was the one from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (THEMMY) of the Technical University of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, led by Professor Leontios Hadjileontiadis, which is set to claim one of the three awards of Microsoft's international Imagine Cup competition next week, with the technological application "Prognosis" for diagnosing Parkinson's disease and assisting diagnosed patients.
The Imagine Cup competition concerns innovative applications by student teams that "use technology to change the world" and is scheduled to be held on July 27-31 in Seattle, Washington.
The purpose of the competition is to highlight the ingenuity of students through technological solutions that aim to address the planet's biggest problems, as set out by UNESCO.
Approximately 330,000 students from universities around the world participated in this year's event, from which twelve teams with the best projects were selected by an international committee.
In Seattle, Washington, the Greek team from the Aristotle University (consisting of students from the TIMMY department Despina Efthymiadou, Dimitris Iakovakis, Konstantinos Mavrodis and Vasiliki Bikia) will compete for one of three awards with cash prizes and investment opportunities.
The Prognosis plan
It is an application for "smart" mobile phones in combination with a wristband that monitors the person's activities and records various data, such as the way of walking and movements, writing, changes in voice and hand stability, sleep quality, etc. - characteristics that can indicate or be associated with the symptoms of Parkinson's disease.
According to Mr. Chatzileontiadis, this data is sent to a large database that the team has created for this purpose, through which indicators for early diagnosis of Parkinson's disease can be derived (for healthy users with a history), and at the same time the analysis models can be enriched.
In the same application for diagnosing Parkinson's disease, already diagnosed patients can be assisted both with walking problems (when walking is interrupted, stimulation is sent to the user from the wristband along with a sound from the mobile phone) and with sleep, through sound stimulation from special headphones, which send low-frequency sounds, in order to keep the brain in a calm state and avoid stress.
Professor Leontios Hadjileontiadis' teams have been distinguished in the "Microsoft Imagine Cup" competition five other times in the past, specifically in 2004 (with Smart Eyes, a navigator for the blind), 2005 (with Scient Talk, a sign language translation project), 2007 (with Noesis, an environment for children with autism), 2011 (with Epioni, a pain management environment) and 2012 (with Symbiosis, a project for Alzheimer's).
This year's selection of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki team was made through a national-level competition in April in Athens, in which it took first place.
source: defencenet
