Researchers from Canada’s Graduate School of Technology and Dartmouth University in the United States have created a unique method that uses an earpiece equipped with tiny microphones to detect early signs of Alzheimer’s disease.
Their results were presented by Myriam Boutros from the Higher School of Technology, on November 19, at the virtual meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, which was held from November 18 to 22.
Alzheimer’s disease affects more than 50 million people worldwide, often with devastating consequences for both the affected individuals and their families and loved ones. There is no known cure for Alzheimer’s disease, and the slow and progressive nature of the disease makes early diagnosis difficult.
Eye movement and Alzheimer’s disease
People with Alzheimer’s disease lose control of movement, in addition to cognitive decline. One of the earliest signs of this deterioration can be seen in involuntary eye movements known as rapid eye movements. These rapid eye twitches in Alzheimer’s patients are often slower, less precise, or delayed compared to those in healthy individuals.
Researcher Ariane Shami from the Higher School of Technology said, “Eye movements are wonderful, because they are among the fastest and most accurate movements in the human body, and therefore they depend on excellent motor skills and cognitive performance.”
Directly detecting and analyzing rapid eye movements requires monitoring the patient with eye-tracking equipment, which is not easily accessible to most people.
Boutros and her colleagues explored an alternative method using a more common and less painful technology: an earpiece equipped with small microphones. This research is led by Rachel Bucerhal in the Hearing Health and Assistive Devices Research Laboratory at the Graduate School of Technology and Chris Niemczak at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine.
Boutros said – according to the Eurek Alert website – “We use hearing aids. It is an earpiece equipped with microphones inside the ear that pick up physiological signals from the body. Our goal is to develop health monitoring algorithms through sounds that can be heard, capable of continuous, long-term monitoring and early detection of diseases.” .
How do we hear the sound of eye movements?
Eye movements, including rapid eye movements, cause eardrum vibrations that can be picked up by sensitive microphones located inside the ear. Researchers conduct experiments on volunteers, equipping them with hearing aids and traditional eye-tracking devices. Their goal is to identify signals corresponding to rapid movements, and to distinguish between healthy signals and others that indicate neurological disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease.
They hope that their research will one day lead to devices that can perform continuous, non-invasive monitoring of Alzheimer’s disease as well as other neurological diseases.
“While the current project focuses on long-term monitoring of Alzheimer’s disease, we would eventually like to address other diseases and be able to differentiate them based on symptoms that can be tracked through signals inside the ear,” Shami said.