BM2601 BIOMEDICAL INSTRUMENTATION

UNIT 2 BIOSIGNAL CHARACTERISTICS BIOSIGNAL CHARACTERISTICS-FREQUENCY AND

AMPLITUDE RANGES

1. ECG-EINTHOVEN’S TRIANGLE,STANDARD 12 LEAD SYSTEMS

Electrocardigraphy

 The Electro Cardio Graphy(ECG) deals with the study of the electrical activity of the
heart muscles. The potentials orignated in the individual fibers of heart muscle are
added to produce the ECG wave form.
 Electro cardiogram is the recorded ECG wave pattern. The electro cardiogram reflects
the rhythemic electrical depolarisation and repolarisation of the myocardium associated
with the contractions of the atria and ventricles.

It shows the typical ECG wave. It consists of P wave, QRS complex, and T wave. The
origin, amplitude and duration of the different waves in the electrocardiogram

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ECG Lead Configurations

Surface electrodes are used with jelly as electrolyte between skin and electrodes. The potential
generated in the heart are conducted to the body surface.

There are three types of electrode system

1. Bipolar limb leads or Standard leads

2. Augmented Unipolar limb leads
3. Chest leads or Precordial leads
4. Frank lead system or correct orthogonal leads

Bipolar limb leads - standard leads I,II and III

In standard lead, the potentials are tapped from four locations of our body. They are i) right
arm , ii) left arm, iii) right leg and iv)left leg. Usually the right leg electrode is acting as ground
reference electrode.

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Lead I :gives voltage v1,the voltage drop from the left arm(LA) to the right arm (RA)
Lead II : gives voltage v2,the voltage drop from the left leg(LL) to the right arm (RA)
Lead III : gives voltage v3,the voltage drop from the left leg(LL) to the Left arm (LA)

 The closed path RA to LA to LL and back to RA is called the Einthoven Triangle.

According to Einthoven, in the frontal plane of the body the cardiac electric field
vector is the two dimensional one.
 Then ECG measured from anyone of the three limb leads is the time variant single
dimensional component of that vector.
 The vector sum of the projections on all the three sides is equal to zero. Thus
following kirchoff's law ,the R wave amplitude of lead II is equal to the sum of R
wave amplitudes of lead I and III.

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Augmented Unipolar limb Leads

 In the augmented unipolar limb leads system ,which is introduced by Wilson ,the
electrocardiogram is recorded between a single exploratory electrode and central
terminal which has a potential corresponding to the center of the body.
 The two equal and large resistors are connected to a pair of limb electrodes and the
center of this resistive network acts a central terminal and remaining limb electrode
acts as the exploratory electrode.
 The augmented lead connections are augmented voltage Right arm
(aVR),augmented voltage Left arm (aVL) and augmented voltage Foot(aVF) as
shown.

FIG Augmented Unipolar limb Leads

By Kirchoff's law , the augmented voltages can be written as in terms of standard leads
voltage:
aVR=-VI-Viii/2
aVL=Vi-Vii/2
aVF=Vii-Vi/2

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Unipolar chest leads

 In the case of unipolar chest leads, the exploratory electrode is obtained from one of
the chest electrodes. The chest electrodes are placed on the six different points on
the chest closed to the heart.
 By connecting three equal large distances to the left arm ,right arm and left leg a
reference electrode or central terminal is obtained. This lead system is known as
Wilson system. Thus the electrocardiograms are recorded from these 12 lead
selections such that 3 standard bipolar leads, 3 augmented unipolar leads and 6
chest leads.

FIG Unipolar chest leads

 The ECG potentials are measured with coloured leads according to the convention,

White - right arm

Black - Left arm
Green - right leg
Red - left leg
Brown - Chest

Frank lead system

The corrected orthogonal leads system (or) Frank lead system is used in vector cardiography.
Further using this lead system, the heart's dipole field is resolved into three mutually
perpendicular components

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ECG RECORDING SETUP

The important parts of ECG recorder are as follows.

1) Patient Cable and Defibrillator Protection Circuit

 The Patient cable connects the different leads from the limbs and chest to the
defibrillator protection circuit. It consists of buffer amplifiers and over voltage
protection circuit.
 The leads are connected with the buffer amplifiers such that one buffer amplifier for
each patient lead.
 The input impedance is increased and the effects arising from the variations in the
electrode impedance are reduced. The over voltage protection circuit is necessary to
avoid any damage to the bioamplifier in recorder. The over voltage of the order of 1000
v.
 This over voltage protection circuit consists of network of resistors and neon lamps
which fire when pulse from a defibrillator is present during firing of the neon lamp there
is no input to the preamplifier of the recorder.

FIG ECG Recording set up

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2) Lead Selector Switch

After the defibrillator protection circuit, there is lead selector switch is used to feed the
input voltage from the appropriate electrode to the preamplifier.

3) Calibrator

 A push button allows the insertion of a standardization voltage of 1mv to the

preamplifier.
 Changing the setting of the lead selector switch introduces an artifact on the recorded
trace. From the lead selector switch the ECG signal goes to bio amplifier.

4) Bio-amplifier

 The bio amplifier consists of a preamplifier and power amplifier.The sensitivity of the
gain of the amplifier can be varied.
 Pen motors in the recorder requires sufficient electrical power to activate the recording
or display.Power amplifiers are reqired with high power gain.
 A power amplifier circuit used to drive ECG chart recorder stylus.Its a push pull type.It
consists of two sillicon power transistor such that the emitter of the transistor are
joined together and connected with a load resistor RLWhen VB is sufficiently
positive,transistor Q1 is forward biased and conducts ,while Q2 is reverse biased and
remains off.
Output power, Pout=V2out/RL
The amplifier efficiency,η=Pout/(Pout+Ploss)

 To avoid the crossover distortion in a push pull amplifier ,an ideal noninverting amplifier
is inserted at the input.
 The offset control is provided by the resistance R2 and is used to position the output
stylus pen, Gain adjustment is provided with the resistance R0.
 The output voltage of this amplifier circuit is given by
Vout=(α1V1)(1+(Rf/Ri))+Rf[[α1V1+VBB/ α2R2+R1]+[ α1V1-VBB/(1- α2)R2+R1]]

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FIG Push Pull power amplifier with crossover compensation and offset control

5) Auxiliary Amplifier

 The electrode impedance are not equal, a differential amplifier does not completely
reject the common mode signals.
 The common mode signals can be reduced to a minimum level by means of adding a
auxiliary amplifier between the driven right leg lead and the ECG unit.
 The right leg is not connected to ground but its connected to the output of the auxiliary
amplifier.
 The output of the auxiliary amplifier is connected to the right leg, it drives the body to
zero common voltage thus the common mode rejection ratio of the overall system is
increased.

6) Isolated Power Supply

 The isolated power supply is used to give power to the bio amplifier and by means of
that , the electrical safety for the patient is increased.

7) Output Unit

 The power amplifier or pen amplifier supplies the required power to drive pen motor.
 A position control on the pen amplifier is used to position the pen at the center on the
recording paper.
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 The stylus pen is heated electrically and the temperature of the stylus pen can be
adjusted with the a stylus in heat control.
 The paper speed is about 25mm/s(U.S paper speed) or 50mm/s(European paper speed).
The faster speed of 50 mm/s is provided to allow better resolution of the QRS complex
at very high heart rate.

8) Power Switch

 The power switch of the recorder has three positions. In the ON position the power to
the amplifier is turned on; but the paper drive is not running .In order to the start paper
drive the switch must be placed in the RUN position.
 In OFF position, the ECG unit is in the switched off condition.

2. EEG-10-20 ELECTRODE SYSTEM,UNIPOLAR,BIPOLAR,AVERAGE MODE

ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPH (EEG)

 Electroencephalography deals with the recording and study of the electrical activity of
the brain. By means of electrodes attached to the skull of a patient , the brain waves can
be picked up and recorded.
 The voltages are about 10mV on the surface of the brain Due to propagation through
skull bone they are attenuated to level from 1 to 1OO uV and which are picked up by
ECG electrodes. They are in the frequency range from 0.5 to 3000 Hz.
 During recording, the electrodes are placed around the frontal, parietal ,temporal and
occipital lobes of the brain. Electroencephalogram is the record of the brain waves
made by an Electroencephalograph.
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Brain Waves

 Electrical recordings from the surface of the brain (or) from the outer surface of head
demonstrate continuous electrical activity in the brain. The undulations in the recorded
electrical potentials are called as brain waves.
 The characteristic of specific abnormalities of the brain occur in normal person can be
classified into alpha, beta, theta and delta waves.

Alpha waves

Frequency : 8-13 Hz
Occurrence: They found in normal persons when they are awake in a quiet ,resting state.The
occur normally occupital region. During sleep ,these disappear .These have amplitude of 20-200
uV with mean of 50 uV.

Beta waves

Frequency :13-30 Hz
Occurrence: These are recorded from the parietal and frontal regions of the scalp.These are
divided into two types as beta I which is inhibited by the cerebral activity and beta II which is
excited by the mental activity, like tension.

Theta waves

Frequency : 4-8 Hz
Occurrence : These are recorded from the parietal and temporal regions of the scalp of the
children. These also occur during emotional stress in some adults particularly during
disappointment and frustration.

Delta waves

Frequency: 0.5 - 4Hz

Occurrence: These occur only in every 2 o 3 seconds. These occur in deep sleep, in premature
babies and in very serious organic brain disease. They can occur strictly in the cortex
independently by the activities in the lower regions of the brain.

Placement of Electrodes

In ECG electrodes are placed in standard positions on the skull in an arrangement called 10-20
systems. The electrodes in this arrangement are placed as follows.

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i) Draw a line on the skull from the nasion, the root of the nose, to the inion,
ossification center (bump) on the occipital lobe.
ii) Draw a similar line from the left preauricular (ear) point to the right preauricular
point
iii) Mark the intersection of these two lines as C which is the midpoint of the
distance between the nasion and inion (or) the distance between the auricular
points.
iv) Mark points at 10, 20, 20, 20 and 10% of the total nasion-inion distance. These
points are Fpz, Fz, Cz, Pz, and Oz
v) Mark points at 10, 20, 20, 20, 20 and 10% of the total distance between the
preauricular points.These points are T3, C3, Cz, C4 and T4. In these odd
numbered points T3 and C3 are on the left and even numbered points C4 and T4.
are on the right

.
vi) Measure the distance between Fpz and 0z, along the great circle passing through
T, and mark points at 10, 20, 20, 20, 20 and 10% of this distance. These are the
positions of Fp1, F7, T3, T5 and O1.
vii) Repeat this procedure on the right side and mark the positions of Fp2 F8, T4. T6
and O2.
viii) Measure the distance between Fp1 and O1, along the great circle passing
through C3 and mark points at 25% intervals. These points give the positions of
F3, C3 and P3.The ground reference electrode is a metal clip on the earlobe.
ix) Repeat this procedure on the right side and mark the positions of F4,C4 and P4.
x) Check that F7, F3, Fz, F4 and F8 are equidistant along the transverse circle
passing through FF, and F and check that T5, P3, Pz, P4 and T6 are equidistant
along the transverse circle passing through T5,Pz and T6. There are
nasopharyngeal electrodes Pg1 and Pg2 and car electrodes A1, and A2.

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Before placing the electrodes, the scale in cleaned. Lightly abraded and electrode paste is
applied between the electrode and the skin. Generally disc like surface electrodes are used.
Needle electrodes are inserted in the scalp to pick up EEG.

 Both bipolar and unipolar (monopolar electrode systems are used to facilitate the
location of foci, that is cortical areas from which abnormal waves spread.
 In bipolar technique the difference in potential between two adjacent electrodes is
measured
 In the monopolar technique the potential of each electrode is measured with respect to
a reference electrode attached to ear lobe or nostrils.
 In the Wilson technique (or) average mode recording techniques the potential is
measured between one of the electrodes (exploring electrode) and the central terminal
which is formed by connecting all electrodes through high, equal resistors to a common
point. Eight channel recorders are very popular.

Recording Setup

In EEG recording setup we have pre and driver amplifiers whose gains are increased by
cascading several stages of amplification.

FIG Block diagram of EEG recording setup

 It shows the modern 8 channel EEG recorder. The patient cable consists of 21 electrodes
and is connected to the eight channel selector.
 The electrodes are attached to the channel selector in groups of eight called a montage
of electrodes. the right ear electrode acts as reference electrode for the righ brain
electrodes and the left ear electrode acts as reference electrode for the left brain
electrodes.

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FIG Modern EEG unit

 The input impedance of the preamplifier should be more than 10 MO to prevent

reduction of signal amplitude.
 The output voltage from the amplifier may either be applied directly to the eight
channel display through the filter bank or it may be stored as data on a tape recorder or
in a computer memory for further processing.
 The filter bank consists of appropriate filters to select different types of brain waves. It
can record evoked potentials from sensory parts of the brain such that there are
external stimuli like visual stimulus, audio stimulus and tactile (touch) stimulus.
 The normal paper chart speed is 30 mm/second.
 There are also 60 mm/second for higher frequency recording and 15 mm/second to
conserve paper during setup time.

Analysis of EEG

EEG helps physicians to diagnose the level of consciousness, sleep disorders, brain death, brain
tumors, epilepsy and multiple sclerosis.

i) Level of consciousness

 The variation of EEG with respect to sleep or the level of consciousness REM means
rapid eye movement. REM sleep coincides with the periods of dreaming

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 EEG displays characteristic features during the application of anesthesia. the brain wave
frequency decreases and the amplitude increases. Thus theta and delta Waves appears.
 In the case of cerebra death (brain death, EEG shows a permanent absence of brain
wave even though respiration and circulation are maintained.

EEG waves for different level of consciousness

Brain Tumors

If the tumor displaces the cortex and if it is large enough, the electrical activity will be absent in
that part of hemisphere, since no electric potentials originate in the tumor itself.
Epilepsy

 Epilepsy is a symptom for brain damage. This may due to defects in the birth delivery or
head injury during accident or boxing.
 Epilepsy is divided into two types grandmal and pertimal.
 The grandmal seizure extends from few seconds to several minutes.
 In the peritmal attack spike type waves are produced with a frequency 3 Hz. and its
seizure lasts for 1-20 seconds.

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3. EMG - Unipolar and Bipolar mode

ELECTROMYOGRAPHY (EMG)

Electromyography is the science of recording and interpreting the electrical activity of muscle's
action potentials. Meanwhile the recording of the peripheral nerve's action potentials is called
electroneurograhy.

 To record the action potentials of individual motor units, the needle electrode isn
inserted into the muscle.
 The action potentials occurs both positive and negative polarities at pair of electrodes
so they may add or cancel each other.
 The contraction of a muscle produces action potentials.

Recording setup

FIG Block diagram for EMG recording setup

The surface electrodes or needle electrodes pickup the potentials produced by the contracting
muscle fibers. The surface of the skin is cleaned and electrode paste is applied.

There are two types of conventional electrodes:

 bipolar and unipolar type electrodes.

 In the case of bipolar electrode, the potential difference between two surface
electrodes resting on the skin is measured.
 In the case of unipolar electrode the reference surface electrode is placed on the skin
and the needle electrode which acts as active electrode, is inserted into the muscle.
 In the case of Coaxial electrode which consists of an insulated wire threaded through a
hyperdermis needle with an oblique tip for easy penetration.

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The amplitude of the EMG signals depends upon the type and placement of electrodes used
and the degree of muscular exertions. That is, the surface electrode picks up many overlapping
spikes and produces an average voltage from various muscles and motor units. The needle
electrode picks up the voltage from a single muscle fiber
 Generally EMG signals range from 0.1 to 0.5 mV
 The normal frequency of EMG is about 60 Hz.
 Normally there are two cathode ray tube one for viewing and other one for recording.
 A light sensitive paper moves over the recording cathode ray tube and the image is
produced on that paper.
 The amplifier should have uniform frequency response in the frequency range from 10
Hz to 1 kHz with high CMRR (100 dB) and input Impedance greater than 10 M-Ohms
Thus EMG is very useful for studying the neuromuscular function, neuromuscular condition,
reflex responses and extent of nerve lesion and diagnosing the muscular diseases like
myasthenia gravis.

Preamplifier:

 The preamplifiers used for EMG are generally of differential type with a good
Bandwidth.
 The input impedance of the amplifier must be greater than 250 MW.
 The preamplifier provides an output with low impedance and, therefore, the high
frequencies do not get attenuated even if long cables are used to connect the
preamplifier.

FIG: Pre-amplifier circuit for an EMG machine.

 The amplifier design provides for a flat frequency response between 10 Hz and 1 kHz,
with a CMRR of 100 dB at the mains frequency.

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 The noise level was found to be 2 mV rms and the input impedance greater than 10
MW.
 The two ICs in the input stage act as voltage followers, which present the desired high
input impedance to the electrodes.
 They are coupled via C1 and R5 to provide a high differential signal gain.
 Capacitor C1 determines the low frequency performance of the circuit. It also eliminates
the effects, at the output, of any dc offsets due to IC1, and IC2 or any imbalance in
electrode potentials.
 The second stage IC3 provides further differential signal gain, while rejecting common-
mode signals.
 The overall gain of the amplifier is 1000.
 The capacitance present parallel with the input resistance of the amplifier reduces the
frequency response of the amplifier.

Low Frequency and High Frequency Filters:

 These are used to select the pass band of the incoming signal and to modify the
progressive reduction in voltage output which occurs at either end of the frequency
spectrum roll-off.
 The low frequency 3 dB point may be selected over the range of 0.016 to 32 Hz while
the high frequency 6 dB point can be selected over the range 16 Hz to 32 kHz

Signal Delay and Trigger Unit:

 To examine the signals from individual fibers of muscle tissue. special needles are
available with a 25 micron diameter
 Electrode surface and up to 14 pick-up surfaces down the side of one needle. These 14
points are scanned sequentially to determine which point is acquiring the largest signal.
 Signals from the remaining 13 points are then scanned sequentially and recorded with
respect to the reference signal.

Integrator:

 The integrator is used for quantifying the activity of a muscle.

 The integrator indicates the EMG activity either as a variable frequency saw tooth
waveform or as a steady deflection.
 The output curve is a measure of the total electrical activity per second,
 Different time constants determine the amount of smoothing applied to the output
signal.

Stimulators:

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 The stimulators incorporated in the EMG machines are used for providing a single or
double pulse or a train of pulses.
 Stimulus amplitude, duration, repetition and delay are all adjustable and facilities are
provided for external triggering.
 The output is either of the constant voltage type or of the constant current type.
 Output of the constant current generator can be adjusted between 0 to 100 mA.
 The electromyographic changes in an advanced diseased state are readily recognized on
an oscilloscope display and by the sound from a loudspeaker.
 Quantities measured for such analysis include zero-crossing rate, peak rate, negative
wave duration and wave rise time.

Determination of conduction velocities in motor nerves

 The measurement of conduction velocity in motor nerves is used to indicate the location
and type of nerve lesion.
 Latency is defined as the time elapsed between the stimulating impulse and the muscles
action potential.
The conduction velocity, v=I1-I2/t1-t2

UNIT 2 - QUESTION BANK

1. Define EEG. (May - 2012)

Electroencephalography(EEG) deals with the recording and study of the electrical
activity of the brain. By means of electrodes attached to the skull of a patient , the brain
waves can be picked up and recorded.

2. Define ECG. (May - 2012)

Electro Cardio Graphy(ECG) deals with the study of the electrical activity of the heart
muscles. The potentials orignated in the individual fibers of heart muscle are added to
produce the ECG wave form. Electro cardiogram is the recorded ECG wave pattern.

3. Define EMG. (May - 2012)

Electromyography(EMG) is the science of recording and interpreting the electrical
activity of muscle's action potentials. Meanwhile the recording of the peripheral nerve's
action potentials is called electroneurograhy.

4. Specify the frequency and amplitude range for various bioelectric signals.(Nov -
2017)(Nov - 2011)

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5. Define Einthoven triangle. (May -2014)(May - 2010)

The closed path RA to LA to LL and back to RA is called the Einthoven Triangle.
According to Einthoven, in the frontal plane of the body the cardiac electric field vector
is the two dimensional one.

6. Sketch a typical LEAD II electro cardiogram and label all waves and intervals.(Apr -2017)

7. Draw the Einthoven triangle for defining ECG leads. (Nov - 2018) (Nov -2017)

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8. Define Wilson system

By connecting three equal large distances to the left arm ,right arm and left leg a
reference electrode or central terminal is obtained. This lead system is known as Wilson
system.

9. What is called 10-20 system

In ECG electrodes are placed in standard positions on the skull in an arrangement called
10-20 systems.

10. What are the average mode techniques used in EEG

Average mode recording techniques the potential is measured between one of the
electrodes (exploring electrode) and the central terminal which is formed by connecting
all electrodes through high, equal resistors to a common point.

11. Draw the different level of consciousness used in EEG waves

12. Draw the block diagram of EMG recording setup

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13. What are the two types of conventional electrodes used in EMG.
Bipolar Electrode:
In the case of bipolar electrode, the potential difference between two surface
electrodes resting on the skin is measured.
Unipolar Electrode:
In the case of unipolar electrode, the reference surface electrode is placed on the skin
and the needle electrode which acts as active electrode, is inserted into the muscle

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