Study On Quantification Of Pulse Image Information

Sphygmology in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has much potential in disease pre-diagnosis, non-organic pathological diagnosis and treatment. The exactly and timely detection of pulse signal is vital importance for the forecast and diagnosis of physiology, pathology and psychology status of human body. Because of the faintness, unquantifiable and subjectivity of Traditional Chinese Medicine, this limited the objective diagnosis of it as well. With the development and application of technology and the penetration of biomedicine, Maths, bio-dynamics, biophysics, computer technology into TCM, objective diagnosis of pulse is a significant and urgent issue need to be solved. At present, equipments were developed mainly for one-dimensional pulse signal acquisition, which is insufficient to reflect comprehensively in the Traditional Chinese Medicine pulse.In order to supplement the shortage of present pulse equipments, a new method for pulse acquisition is presented—visualization of pulse signals by dynamic image sequences. The dynamical pulse images were collected by a high speed, high resolution camera. The multi-dimensional pulse information was acquired through image analysis and processing.Firstly, the pulse image sensor was introduced, including its structure, design and operating mechanism. The higher speed, higher resolution camera was adopted and the device seal problem was solved. So, the sensor is more effective and convenience than been improved before.Image analysis contains much information and analysis methods are also abundant. Therefore, how to acquire pulse information from dynamic images is the core in this paper. Firstly, the availability of pulse image sensor was confirmed by the pulse wave been acquired from pulse dynamical images through applying area centre law, correlation law and differential law. Then, after the camera calibration, the quantitative multi-points pulse information was acquired through using invariable image moment,defocus law and variable gridding area while according to imaging theory. Finally, the three dimension pulse image signal was reconstructed.Finally, dynamic images of two subjects were analyzed by using time-domain index of pulse waves which based on image gray analysis and invariable image moment law. It indicated that the pulse image sensor can be applied to clinical diagnosis in future. The multi-dimension information including pulse velocity, pulse width, pulse length, etc were calculated from pulse image as well.The results show that more pulse information can be acquired by using pulse image sensor than other pulse sensors. Moreover, it provides a new idea and approach for the objective study on pulse diagnosis.