US20150124566A1

US20150124566A1 - Systems, articles and methods for wearable electronic devices employing contact sensors

Info

Publication number: US20150124566A1
Application number: US14/505,836
Authority: US
Inventors: Stephen Lake; Matthew Bailey
Original assignee: Thalmic Labs Inc
Current assignee: Meta Platforms Technologies LLC
Priority date: 2013-10-04
Filing date: 2014-10-03
Publication date: 2015-05-07
Also published as: US20180150033A1; US11644799B2

Abstract

Wearable electronic devices that employ one or more contact sensors (e.g., capacitive sensors and/or biometric sensors) are described. Contact sensors include electromyography sensors and/or capacitive touch sensors. Capacitive touch sensors include single-frequency capacitive touch sensors, recently-proposed swept frequency capacitive touch sensors, and a generalized version of swept frequency capacitive touch sensors referred to as multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors. The contact sensors are integrated into various devices, including generic watchstraps that may be substituted for the existing watchstrap in any wristwatch design, generic watch back-plates that may be substituted for the existing back-plate in any wristwatch design, and wearable electromyography devices that provide gesture-based control in a human-electronics interface.

Description

BACKGROUND

1. Technical Field
The present systems, articles and methods generally relate to wearable electronic devices having on-board sensors, and particularly relate to wearable electronic devices that incorporate one or more contact sensor(s) of any one or more of a variety of different types.
2. Description of the Related Art

Wearable Electronic Devices

Electronic devices are commonplace throughout most of the world today. Advancements in integrated circuit technology have enabled the development of electronic devices that are sufficiently small and lightweight to be carried by the user. Such “portable” electronic devices may include on-board power supplies (such as batteries or other power storage systems) and may be designed to operate without any wire-connections to other electronic systems; however, a small and lightweight electronic device may still be considered portable even if it includes a wire-connection to another electronic system. For example, a microphone may be considered a portable electronic device whether it is operated wirelessly or through a wire-connection.
The convenience afforded by the portability of electronic devices has fostered a huge industry. Smartphones, audio players, laptop computers, tablet computers, and ebook readers are all examples of portable electronic devices. However, the convenience of being able to carry a portable electronic device has also introduced the inconvenience of having one's hand(s) encumbered by the device itself. This problem is addressed by making an electronic device not only portable, but wearable.
A wearable electronic device is any portable electronic device that a user can carry without physically grasping, clutching, or otherwise holding onto the device with their hands. For example, a wearable electronic device may be attached or coupled to the user by a strap or straps, a band or bands, a clip or clips, an adhesive, a pin and clasp, an article of clothing, tension or elastic support, an interference fit, an ergonomic form, etc. Examples of wearable electronic devices include digital wristwatches, electronic armbands, electronic rings, electronic ankle-bracelets or “anklets,” head-mounted electronic display units, hearing aids, and so on.

Human-Electronics Interfaces

A wearable electronic device may provide direct functionality for a user (such as audio playback, data display, computing functions, etc.) or it may provide electronics to interact with, receive information from, or control another electronic device. For example, a wearable electronic device may include sensors that detect inputs effected by a user and transmit signals to another electronic device based on those inputs. Sensor-types and input-types may each take on a variety of forms, including but not limited to: tactile sensors (e.g., buttons, switches, touchpads, or keys) providing manual control, acoustic sensors providing voice-control, electromyography sensors providing gesture control, and/or accelerometers providing gesture control.
A human-computer interface (“HCI”) is an example of a human-electronics interface. The present systems, articles, and methods may be applied to HCIs, but may also be applied to any other form of human-electronics interface.

Smart Watches

The concept of a wristwatch with on-board computation capabilities and functionality beyond timekeeping (i.e., a “smart watch”) has been around for decades. Seiko and Casio were building digital wristwatches with user-programmable memory and computing capability as far back as in the 1980s. However, at least as a consequence of their limited functionality, the initial designs for smart watches never took off in consumer markets.
Motivated by the availability of more advanced integrated circuit, display, and battery technologies, there has recently been a resurgence in the smart watch industry. Exemplary smart watches that are currently known to be under development include: the Apple Watch, the Samsung Galaxy Gear™, the Sony SmartWatch™, the Qualcomm Toq™, and the Pebble™ by Pebble Technology. Each of these examples provides (or is expected to provide) various functions and capabilities and employs a unique design and geometry. However, all of these designs are fundamentally similar in that they essentially emulate the design of a traditional wristwatch. That is, each design comprises a housing that is physically coupled to a strap or band that fits around the user's wrist, the housing having a display on one side and a back-plate proximate the user's wrist on the side opposite the display. Conforming to this generic arrangement is a design constraint for virtually any smart watch, as most smart watches are designed to resemble the traditional wristwatch as much as possible.
The back-plate that is common to all known wristwatch designs (both traditional and smart watches alike) provides structural support and protects the internal components (circuitry or gears, etc.) of the wristwatch from its environment. Otherwise, the back-plate that is common to all known wristwatch designs does not typically provide or enable other functions and/or capabilities of the wristwatch. Similarly, the strap or band (or similar, hereafter “watchstrap”) that is common to virtually all known wristwatch designs (both traditional and smart watches alike) typically serves one purpose: holding the watch in position on the user's wrist. Beyond this, the watchstrap that is common to virtually all known wristwatch designs does not typically impart or enable any functionality or capability in the watch itself.

Contact Sensors

The human body generates electrical signals that may be non-invasively sensed by sensors that physically contact the user's skin (either directly or through an electrically insulative medium such as a dielectric layer). Such “contact sensors” may couple to these electrical signals through, for example, capacitive coupling or via non-capacitive coupling for instance resistive coupling and/or galvanic coupling. This property is exploited in, for example, electromyography (“EMG”) sensors that detect the electrical signals produced by a user's muscles when the user performs a physical gesture. The human body also has a capacitance of its own (i.e., the “body capacitance”) that enables it to store charge and act as a capacitor. This property is exploited in some capacitive touch sensing technologies, such as in the capacitive touchscreens of many portable electronic devices today. Typical capacitive touchscreens employ a conductive screen that is excited by an electrical signal at a single, fixed frequency. When a user touches the screen, the body capacitance of the user causes changes in this signal that are detected by a sensing circuit. Throughout the remainder of this specification and the appended claims, capacitive touch sensors that employ a single electrical frequency are referred to as “single-frequency capacitive touch sensors.”
Recently, a new type of touch sensing technology that employs a range of electrical signal frequencies has been developed by Disney Research. Dubbed “Touché,” this new type of touch sensing technology takes advantage of the fact that different types of touch events may have different effects at different signal frequencies. The electrical signal that is used to excite the conductive screen is swept over a continuous range of electrical signal frequencies and the sensing circuit monitors changes in the corresponding return signal at various frequencies over the sweep. In this way, a frequency profile of the touch event is established, where each detectably-different type of touch event (e.g., one finger, two finger, pinch, swipe, etc.) produces a unique frequency profile that may be identified using, for example, machine intelligence algorithms, pattern recognition algorithms, and the like. Throughout the remainder of this specification and the appended claims, capacitive touch sensors that sweep over a continuous range of electrical frequencies in this manner are referred to as “swept frequency capacitive touch sensors.” Swept frequency capacitive touch sensors are described in, for example, Sato et al., “Touché: Enhancing Touch Interaction on Humans, Screens, Liquids, and Everyday Objects,” presented at CHI '12, May 5-10, 2012 and available online: http://www.disneyresearch.com/project/touche-touch-and-gesture-sensing-for-the-real-world/ (last accessed Sep. 29, 2014), which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
Each different type of capacitive sensor described above may be implemented by substantially similar hardware. Essentially, at least one electrically conductive element (such as a plate of electrically conductive material or a conductive screen) is provided as a contact sensor or electrode and is electrically coupled to circuitry (e.g., electrical or electronic circuitry) by at least one electrically communicative pathway. Depending on the implementation, the electrically conductive material of an electrode may be bare and physically contact the skin of the user directly, or the electrically conductive material may be coated with an insulative layer (such as a dielectric layer) that physically couples to the skin of the user. At least one aspect that is unique to each of the different sensor types described above is the nature and function of the circuitry to which the at least one electrically conductive element is coupled.
In general, sensors that are responsive to and detect signals produced, generated, or otherwise effected by the human body are referred to herein as “biometric sensors.” Contact sensors are examples of biometric sensors that couple to the user's skin, and capacitive sensors (e.g., capacitive biometric sensors) are examples of contact sensors; however, other forms of contact sensors may couple to the user's skin through other means, such as through resistive coupling.

BRIEF SUMMARY

A wristwatch may be summarized as including: a housing having a top surface that includes a display and an inner cavity that includes a timekeeping device; and a watchstrap that is flexible and carries a set of components and a set of communication pathways, the watchstrap physically coupled to the housing, wherein the set of components includes at least one contact sensor (e.g., at least one biometric contact sensor) and at least one communication terminal, and wherein the at least one communication terminal is communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways. The set of components carried by the watchstrap may further include at least one component selected from the group consisting of: a battery, an inductive charging element, an inertial sensor, a pedometer, a compass, a Global Position System unit, an altimeter, a digital processor, and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium. The set of components carried by the watchstrap may include a digital processor communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the digital processor, and the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium may store processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.
The at least one contact sensor may be carried on a first surface of the watchstrap, the first surface in physical contact with a user when the watchstrap is worn around a wrist of the user. The set of components carried by the watchstrap may include at least one component that is carried on a second surface of the watchstrap, the second surface opposite the first surface. The set of components carried by the watchstrap may include at least one component that is carried within the watchstrap.
The at least one contact sensor may include at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor. The display may include at least one of: a window, a digital display screen, and/or a touchscreen. The at least one communication terminal may include a wireless communication terminal.
The at least one communication terminal may include a wired communication terminal. The housing may include circuitry and at least one component in the set of components carried by the watchstrap may be communicatively coupled to the circuitry of the housing through the wired communication terminal.
A composition of the watchstrap may be selected from the group consisting of: a single piece of flexible material, multiple layers of flexible material, a single piece of elastic material, multiple layers of elastic material, and a set of substantially rigid links physically coupled together by at least one adaptive coupler. Communicative coupling between the at least one contact sensor and the at least one communication terminal may be mediated by at least one additional component in the set of components carried by the watchstrap.
A watchstrap for integration into a wristwatch may be summarized as including: a flexible strap; a set of communication pathways carried by the strap; and a set of components carried by the strap, the set of components including at least one contact sensor (e.g., at least one biometric contact sensor) and at least one communication terminal, wherein the at least one communication terminal is communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways. The set of components carried by the strap may further include any or all of: a battery communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways; an inductive charging element communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways; an inertial sensor communicatively coupled to the at least one communication terminal by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways; and/or a pedometer communicatively coupled to the at least one communication terminal by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways.
The set of components carried by the strap may include: a digital processor communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor; and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the digital processor, wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.
The at least one contact sensor may include at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor. The strap may be sized and dimensioned to mate with a wristwatch housing. The at least one contact sensor may include multiple contact sensors. The at least one communication terminal may include at least one of a wireless communication terminal and/or a wired communication terminal. Communicative coupling between the at least one contact sensor and the at least one communication terminal may be mediated by at least one additional component in the set of components carried by the strap.
The strap may include a first surface and a second surface, and at least one component in the set of components carried by the strap may be carried on the first surface of the strap and at least one component in the set of components carried by the strap may be carried on the second surface of the strap. At least one component in the set of components carried by the strap may be carried within the strap.
A wristwatch may be summarized as including: a wristband; a housing physically coupled to the wristband, the housing comprising: a top surface that includes a display; and a back-plate formed of a substantially rigid material and positioned underneath the top surface, wherein the back-plate and the top surface together define a cavity therebetween, and wherein the back-plate includes a first surface that carries at least one contact sensor (e.g., at least one biometric contact sensor) and a second surface that carries circuitry, the second surface opposite the first surface and the circuitry contained within the cavity and communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor; and a digital processor contained within the cavity, the digital processor communicatively coupled to the circuitry. The housing may further comprise at least one sidewall formed of a substantially rigid material, the at least one sidewall providing physical coupling between the top surface and the back-plate, wherein the top surface, the back-plate, and the at least one sidewall form a hollow volume that encompasses the cavity.
The housing may have a geometry with a two-dimensional projection that is selected from the group consisting of: substantially square, substantially rectangular, substantially circular, and substantially polygonal. The housing may be substantially planar.
The housing may further comprise at least one component selected from the group consisting of: a battery contained within the cavity, a wireless transmitter, an inductive charging element contained within the cavity, an inertial sensor contained within the cavity, a pedometer contained within the cavity, and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium contained within the cavity. The housing may include a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium contained within the cavity, and the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium may store processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor. The at least one component may be carried by the second surface of the back-plate.
The at least one contact sensor may include at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor. The display may include at least one of: a window, a digital display screen, and/or a touchscreen. The circuitry carried by the second surface of the back-plate may be communicatively isolated from the display, and the circuitry carried by the second surface of the back-plate may include the digital processor and a wireless transmitter communicatively coupled to the digital processor.
A back-plate for integration into a wristwatch may be summarized as including: a plate of substantially rigid material; at least one contact sensor (e.g., at least one biometric contact sensor) carried on a first side of the plate; circuitry carried on a second side of the plate, the second side opposite the first side, wherein the at least one contact sensor is communicatively coupled to the circuitry; and at least one component selected from the group consisting of: a tethered connector port communicatively coupled to the circuitry, the tethered connector port to in use communicatively couple to at least one electrical or electronic component of a wristwatch; and a wireless transmitter communicatively coupled to the circuitry, the wireless transmitter to in use wirelessly transmit data provided by the at least one contact sensor. The back-plate may further include any or all of: a battery carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to the circuitry; an inductive charging element carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to the circuitry; an inertial sensor carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to the circuitry; and/or a pedometer carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to the circuitry.
The back-plate may include a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium carried on the second side of the plate, wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor. The back-plate may further include a digital processor carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to both the circuitry and the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium.
The at least one contact sensor may include at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor. The plate may be sized and dimensioned to mate with a wristwatch housing and to provide an underside thereof. The at least one contact sensor may include multiple contact sensors. The plate may be substantially planar in geometry.
A wearable electronic device may be summarized as including: at least one electromyography (“EMG”) sensor responsive to muscle activity corresponding to a gesture performed by a user of the wearable electronic device and to provide signals in response thereto; at least one capacitive touch sensor responsive to physical contact between the user and an object and to provide signals in response thereto; a processor communicatively coupled to the at least one EMG sensor and to the at least one capacitive touch sensor; and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the processor, the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium storing: processor-executable gesture identification instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to identify a gesture performed by the user based at least in part on signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor; and processor-executable touch sensing instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to process signals provided by the at least one capacitive touch sensor. The at least one capacitive touch sensor may include a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and/or a swept frequency capacitive touch sensor.
The wearable electronic device may further include at least one communication terminal communicatively coupled to the processor, the at least one communication terminal to transmit signals to a receiving device, wherein the signals are based on at least one of: signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor and/or signals provided by the at least one capacitive touch sensor. The wearable electronic device may include at least one inertial sensor communicatively coupled to the processor, the at least one inertial sensor responsive to motion corresponding to the gesture performed by the user of the wearable electronic device and to provide at least one signal in response thereto, wherein the processor-executable gesture identification instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to identify the gesture performed by the user based at least in part on signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor cause the processor to identify the gesture performed by the user based at least in part on both signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor and at least one signal provided by the at least one inertial sensor.
The wearable electronic device may comprise a set of pod structures that form physically coupled links of the wearable electronic device, wherein each pod structure in the set of pod structures is positioned adjacent and in between two other pod structures in the set of pod structures and physically coupled to the two other pod structures in the set of pod structures, and wherein the set of pod structures forms a perimeter of an annular configuration.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

In the drawings, identical reference numbers identify similar elements or acts. The sizes and relative positions of elements in the drawings are not necessarily drawn to scale. For example, the shapes of various elements and angles are not drawn to scale, and some of these elements are arbitrarily enlarged and positioned to improve drawing legibility. Further, the particular shapes of the elements as drawn are not intended to convey any information regarding the actual shape of the particular elements, and have been solely selected for ease of recognition in the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an exemplary wristwatch that includes an enhanced watchstrap employing contact sensors in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 2A is a plan view showing a contact surface of an exemplary enhanced watchstrap in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 2B is a side elevational view of the exemplary enhanced watchstrap from FIG. 2A showing the relative positions of components on the surfaces and in the inner volume thereof, in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of an exemplary wristwatch that includes an enhanced back-plate having at least one contact sensor in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 4 is a plan view showing an underside of a wristwatch and thereby providing a clearer view (compared to the perspective view of FIG. 3) of a back-plate that is enhanced in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view of an enhanced back-plate for integration into a wristwatch in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view of an exemplary wearable electromyography (“EMG”) device that includes two contact sensor types: a set of capacitive EMG sensors and at least one capacitive touch sensor in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In the following description, certain specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of various disclosed embodiments. However, one skilled in the relevant art will recognize that embodiments may be practiced without one or more of these specific details, or with other methods, components, materials, etc. In other instances, well-known structures associated with electronic devices, and in particular wearable electronic devices such as wristwatches, have not been shown or described in detail to avoid unnecessarily obscuring descriptions of the embodiments.
Unless the context requires otherwise, throughout the specification and claims which follow, the word “comprise” and variations thereof, such as, “comprises” and “comprising” are to be construed in an open, inclusive sense, that is as “including, but not limited to.”
Reference throughout this specification to “one embodiment” or “an embodiment” means that a particular feature, structures, or characteristics may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments.
As used in this specification and the appended claims, the singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” include plural referents unless the content clearly dictates otherwise. It should also be noted that the term “or” is generally employed in its broadest sense, that is as meaning “and/or” unless the content clearly dictates otherwise.
The headings and Abstract of the Disclosure provided herein are for convenience only and do not interpret the scope or meaning of the embodiments.
The various embodiments described herein provide systems, articles, and methods for wearable electronic devices that employ biometric contact sensors. Different types of contact sensors are employed, including without limitation electromyography (“EMG”) sensors, single-frequency capacitive touch sensors, and/or swept frequency capacitive touch sensors. Swept frequency capacitive touch sensors are described in, for example, Sato et al.; however, in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, the concept of probing multiple electrical frequencies of a capacitive touch sensor may be generalized to implementations that do not actually sweep the electrical frequency over a continuous range, such as implementations that simply probe two or more discrete electrical signal frequencies. Probing multiple discrete signal frequencies without continuously sweeping in between can be advantageous in some applications because such simplifies the electric circuitry involved, simplifies the signal processing involved, and can also be designed to specifically target frequencies that are of particular relevance (e.g., for pattern recognition purposes) to a specific application. Throughout this specification and the appended claims, capacitive touch sensors that implement more than a single, fixed frequency are generally referred to as “multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors,” where swept frequency capacitive touch sensors are a subset of multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors, but any implementation of a capacitive touch sensor that is operative to probe multiple distinct electrical signal frequencies (e.g., “bi-frequency capacitive touch sensors” employing two frequencies, “tri-frequency capacitive touch sensors” employing three frequencies, and so on for any number of frequencies) constitutes a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor herein.
Contact sensors may be incorporated into a dedicated device such as a wearable electronic armband, or they may be incorporated into a device that otherwise provides a different function, such as a wristwatch. For example, the functionality of any wristwatch may be enhanced by incorporating at least one contact sensor into the watchstrap and/or watch housing back-plate. In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, a generic watchstrap and/or watch housing back-plate design that includes at least one contact sensor may be adapted to fit to or be used in conjunction with any known wristwatch design, and incorporated into virtually any wristwatch during manufacturing thereof. Such “enhanced” watchstraps and/or back-plates can add capacitive sensing and/or other capabilities to “traditional” watch designs (i.e., non-smart watch designs) to effectively transform the traditional watch into a smart watch, and/or can add new sensing and/or other capabilities to smart watch designs.
In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, one or more EMG sensor(s) may be used to detect electrical activity produced by the muscles of a user when the user performs a physical gesture and to enable a wearable electronic device that includes the one or more EMG sensor(s) to transmit gesture-specific signals to a receiving device as part of a human-electronics interface. One or more capacitive touch sensor(s) (such as one or more single-frequency capacitive touch sensor(s) and/or one or more multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor(s)) may be used to detect physical contact between a user and an object (i.e., when and/or how a user physically touches an object), to provide signals in response to the detected physical contact, and to enable a wearable electronic device that includes the one or more capacitive touch sensor(s) to transmit touch-specific signals to a receiving device as part of a human-electronics interface.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an exemplary wristwatch 100 that includes an enhanced watchstrap 101 in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Enhanced watchstrap 101 enwraps the wrist of a user to secure wristwatch 100 in position on the user's wrist, in much the same way as any generic watchstrap. Enhanced watchstrap 101 may be elastic, fabric, cloth, leather, formed of serially-coupled links, or any other flexible material and may or may not include a latch, clasp, or other fastening device (not shown in FIG. 1). Wristwatch 100 also includes a housing 110 having a top surface 111 and a back-plate 112. Back-plate 112 may be a simple rigid surface with no further functionality or back-plate 112 may be an enhanced back-plate as described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/887,193 and/or U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/887,812, each of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
The top surface 111 of housing 110 includes a window or display that may provide a means of conveying information to a user (such as the time, etc.) and/or an interface through which the user may program and/or control functions of wristwatch 100. For example, wristwatch 100 may be a traditional analog or mechanical watch, in which case the display of the top surface 111 of housing 110 may include a simple sheet of transparent material such as glass or plastic (commonly referred to as the “crystal”) forming a window through which the hands of an analog watch face may be seen by the user, or wristwatch 100 may be a traditional digital watch, in which case the display of the top surface 111 of housing 110 may include a digital display screen, or wristwatch 100 may be a smart watch, in which case the display of the top surface 111 of housing 110 may include a touchscreen. Housing 110 may include an inner cavity that contains a timekeeping device, including without limitation: one or more gear(s), one or more clockwork(s), one or more quartz oscillator(s), and/or any other component or device known in the art of timekeeping. In some implementations, the cavity may include circuitry (e.g., electrical and/or electronic circuitry). Wristwatch 100 may be substantially similar to any known wristwatch except that wristwatch 100 includes enhanced watchstrap 101 providing additional functions and/or capabilities in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.
Exemplary enhanced watchstrap 101 includes on-board devices 121 122, and 130. In principle, the enhanced watchstraps of the present systems, articles, and methods may include any number of devices. Exemplary devices 121 and 122 are contact sensors or transducers (hereafter “contact sensors”) that may be used to detect, measure, monitor, or otherwise sense one or more activity(ies), parameter(s), characteristic(s), and/or other aspect(s) of the user of (i.e., the wearer of) wristwatch 100. Two contact sensors 121 and 122 are illustrated in FIG. 1 for exemplary purposes only. In practice, any number (e.g., one, two, three, or more than three) of contact sensors may be included in watchstrap 101.
Contact sensors 121, 122 may include any type or types of contact sensors, including without limitation one or more EMG sensor(s), one or more single-frequency capacitive touch sensor(s), and/or one or more multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor(s), one or more magnetomyography sensor(s), one or more acoustic myography sensor(s), one or more mechanomyography sensor(s), one or more electrocardiography sensor(s), one or more blood pressure sensor(s), one or more thermometer(s), and/or one or more skin conductance sensor(s). Contact sensors 121, 122 may include any type or types of biometric sensor(s) that are responsive to signals detected through physical contact with the user's skin. Enhanced watchstrap 101 may, if desired, also include one or more other form(s) of sensor(s), such as one or more pedometer(s), one or more inertial sensor(s) such as one or more accelerometer(s) and/or one or more gyroscope(s), one or more compass(es), one or more location sensor(s) such as one or more Global Positioning System (GPS) unit(s), one or more altimeter(s), and so on.
Exemplary device 130 is circuitry (e.g., electrical and/or electronic circuitry) that is communicatively coupled to contact sensors 121, 122 and may include a wide variety of components depending on the specific implementation. In exemplary wristwatch 100, circuitry 130 includes an amplification circuit to amplify signals provided by contact sensors 121 and 122, a filtering circuit to filter signals provided by contact sensors 121 and 122, an analog-to-digital converter to convert analog signals provided by contact sensors 121 and 122 into digital signals, a digital processor to process the signals provided by contact sensors 121 and 122, and a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium or memory to store processor-executable instructions that, when executed by the digital processor in circuitry 130, cause the digital processor in circuitry 130 to process the signals provided by contact sensors 121 and 122. In other implementations, the circuitry of an enhanced watchstrap in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods may include other components in addition to or instead of the components included in circuitry 130 of enhanced watchstrap 101, including without limitation: one or more battery(ies), one or more inductive charging elements, and/or one or more communication terminal(s) such as one or more wireless transmitter(s) and/or receiver(s) (either separately or combined as a wireless transceiver) employing a wireless communication protocol such as Bluetooth®, WiFi™, and/or NFC™, one or more tethered connector port(s) (e.g., one or more Universal Serial Bus (USB) port(s), one or more mini-USB port(s), one or more micro-USB port(s), and/or one or more Thunderbolt® port(s)), and/or any other form or forms of communication terminal(s), such as without limitation: one or more socket(s), one or more bonding pad(s), one or more set(s) of pins, and the like.
Any or all of on- board devices 121, 122, and/or 130 may be carried, in whole or in part, on a first surface (i.e., a “contact surface” that is in contact with a user's skin when wristwatch 100 is worn directly on a wrist of the user) of enhanced watchstrap 101. While the electrodes of contact sensors 121 and 121 generally need to contact the user's skin when enhanced watchstrap 101 is worn, further portions of sensors 121, 122 and/or device 130 (in whole or in part), may be carried on a second surface (i.e., a “non-contact surface” that is not in contact with the user's skin when wristwatch 100 is worn directly on the wrist of the user) of enhanced watchstrap 101 and/or carried within enhanced watchstrap 101.
Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “inductive charging element” is used to refer to a component of an inductive charging system that is designed to receive power transfer via inductive coupling. A person of skill in the art will appreciate that an inductive charging element may include a coil of conductive wire that receives power transfer when positioned proximate an alternating magnetic field.
Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “communication terminal” is generally used to refer to any physical structure that provides a communications link through which a data signal may enter and/or leave a device (or a component of a device, such as enhanced watchstrap 101). A communication terminal represents the end (or “terminus”) of communicative signal transfer within a device (or a component of a device) and the beginning of communicative signal transfer with an external device (or a separate component of the device). In the case of a communication terminal in circuitry 130, the term “terminal” means that the communication terminal in circuitry 130 represents the end of communicative signal transfer within/on enhanced watchstrap 101 and the beginning of communicative signal transfer with other components of wristwatch 100 and/or with one or more device(s) separate from wristwatch 100 (e.g., one or more smartphone(s), one or more desktop, laptop, or tablet computer(s), etc.).
FIG. 2A is a plan view showing a contact surface 210 a of an exemplary enhanced watchstrap 200 in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Watchstrap 200 may be designed and/or adapted to fit or otherwise mate with any wristwatch (e.g., any mechanical, digital, analog, or smart watch housing, not shown in FIG. 2A) in a substantially similar way to that described for enhanced strap 101 of wristwatch 100 from FIG. 1. As FIG. 2A depicts the contact surface 210 a of watchstrap 200 (i.e., the surface of strap 200 that contacts the user when strap 200 is worn), the bottom surface of watchstrap 200 is not visible in FIG. 2A; however, some features and devices that are included on the bottom surface of watchstrap 200 and within watchstrap 200 are illustrated in FIG. 2A for discussion purposes but shown in broken, dashed lines in FIG. 2A to indicate that such features and devices may not actually be visible in the plan view of FIG. 2A.
In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, a watchstrap for integration with a wristwatch may include at least one contact sensor, and thereby provide enhanced functionality/capability for the wristwatch. Enhanced watchstrap 200 includes contact sensors 221 and 222. Contact sensors 221 and 222 may include, for example, electromyography sensors such as those described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/771,500 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/194,252), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/903,238, and/or U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/909,786, each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. Either instead of or in addition to EMG sensors, contact sensors 221, 222 may include any type or types of biometric sensor(s) that are responsive to signals detected through physical contact with the user's skin, for example, single-frequency capacitive touch sensors, multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors, magnetomyography sensor(s), and so on (i.e., as described for watchstrap 101 in FIG. 1). In any case, at least an electrode portion of at least one contact sensor 221, 222 is positioned on the contact surface 210 a of watchstrap 200 so that the at least one contact sensor 221, 222 may be positioned proximate (e.g., in physical contact with) the skin of the user.
Watchstrap 200 may be sized and dimensioned to mate (e.g., via at least one latch, pin, clasp, connector, or the like) with any wristwatch design to provide a strap or band therefor. The enhanced watchstraps described in the present systems, articles, and methods may comprise a single-piece of material (e.g., elastic material, flexible material, stretchable material, etc.) or multiple segments, links, or sections of material (e.g., rigid or semi-rigid material) adaptively coupled together by at least one adaptive coupler. For ease of illustration, watchstrap 200 in FIG. 2A is formed of a single-piece of flexible material such as fabric, cloth, leather, or similar. Watchstrap 200 may be substantially planar when laid out flat but may generally be curved in use.
The term “adaptive coupler” is used throughout this specification and the appended claims to denote a system, article or device that provides flexible, adjustable, modifiable, extendable, extensible, or otherwise “adaptive” physical coupling. Adaptive coupling is physical coupling between two objects that permits limited motion of the two objects relative to one another. An example of an adaptive coupler is an elastic material such as an elastic band.
The plan view of FIG. 2A depicts the contact surface 210 a of watchstrap 200 which carries contact sensors 221 and 222. Additional components (i.e., components 231, 232, 234, and 235 illustrated with wide-dashed lines in FIG. 2A) of watchstrap 200 are carried on a non-contact surface thereof (i.e., the surface of watchstrap 200 that is furthest from and does not contact the skin of the user when worn), and still further components (i.e., components 233 and 236 illustrated with dotted lines in FIG. 2A) of watchstrap 200 are carried in an inner volume thereof. Watchstrap 200 includes communication pathways 240 (only one called out in FIG. 2A to reduce clutter) that couple to and between various components of watchstrap 200 to provide communicative coupling therebetween. Portions of communication pathways 240 may be carried on the contact surface 210 a, the non-contact surface, and/or in the inner volume of watchstrap 200. In some embodiments, additional components may be carried on the sides or edges of watchstrap 200.
Throughout this specification and the appended claims the term “communicative” as in “communicative pathway,” “communicative coupling,” and in variants such as “communicatively coupled,” is generally used to refer to any engineered arrangement for transferring and/or exchanging information. Exemplary communicative pathways include, but are not limited to, electrically conductive pathways (e.g., electrically conductive wires, electrically conductive traces), magnetic pathways (e.g., magnetic media), and/or optical pathways (e.g., optical fiber), and exemplary communicative couplings include, but are not limited to, electrical couplings, magnetic couplings, and/or optical couplings. Furthermore, the term “communicatively coupled” is generally used throughout this specification and the appended claims to include direct, 1:1 communicative coupling and indirect or “mediated” communicative coupling. For example, a component A may be communicatively coupled to a component B directly by at least one communication pathway, or a component A may be communicatively coupled to a component B indirectly by at least a first communication pathway that directly couples component A to a component C and at least a second communication pathway that directly couples component C to component B. In this case, component C is said to mediate the communicative coupling between component A and component B.
To clarify the spatial arrangement of the components 221, 222, 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 236, and 240 of watchstrap 200 illustrated in the plan view of FIG. 2A, FIG. 2B provides a side elevational view of the same exemplary watchstrap configuration.
FIG. 2B is a side elevational view of exemplary enhanced watchstrap 200 from FIG. 2A showing the relative positions of components on the surfaces and in the inner volume thereof, in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. In the side elevational view of FIG. 2B, both contact surface 210 a and non-contact surface 210 b of watchstrap 200 are visible. Contact surface 210 a carries contact sensors 221 and 222 while non-contact surface 210 b carries components 231, 232, 234, and 235. The inner volume of watchstrap 200 carries components 233 and 236, which are illustrated in dotted lines in FIG. 2B to indicate that they might not be visible in the view of FIG. 2B.
Watchstrap 200 provides an illustrative example of an enhanced watchstrap in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. In alternative implementations, more or fewer components (including all or no components) may be carried on the contact surface, on the non-contact surface, and/or in the inner volume of an enhanced watchstrap.
With reference to both FIGS. 2A and 2B, watchstrap 200 includes contact sensors 221, 222 that are communicatively coupled by at least one communication pathway 240 to circuitry 233. Circuitry 233 includes at least one of an amplification circuit, a filtering circuit, and/or an analog-to-digital conversion circuit, and is communicatively coupled by at least one communication pathway 240 to an on-board processor 231. Processor 231 is communicatively coupled to a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium or memory 232. Memory 232 stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by processor 231, cause processor 231 to process signals provided by contact sensors 221 and 222. For example, processor-executable contact sensing instructions may, when executed by processor 231, cause processor 231 to perform gesture identification based on EMG sensor signals as described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/881,064 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/494,274) and/or U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/894,263 (each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety) and/or for processing single-frequency and/or multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor signals. Processor 231 is also communicatively coupled (by respective communication pathways 240) to first and second communication terminals 235 and 236. Communication terminal 235 is a wireless communication terminal (e.g., a Bluetooth® transmitter and/or receiver) that enables information from processor 231 to be sent wirelessly to any receiving device, such as a smartphone, computer, etc. Communication terminal 236 is a wired communication terminal that may, for example, provide a direct communicative coupling point between watchstrap 200 and a housing (e.g., housing 110 from FIG. 1) of a wristwatch, where the housing includes a clock face and other watch/smartwatch elements.
Watchstrap 200 also includes at least one power source 234 that is communicatively coupled to all components of watchstrap 200 that require power. Power source 234 may include at least one battery and/or at least one inductive charging element.
Communication pathways 240 may be implemented in a variety of forms. For example, communication pathways 240 may include electrical wires and/or conductive traces. In the latter case, at least one flexible printed circuit board may be carried on at least one surface 210 a, 210 b of watchstrap 200 and/or in an inner volume of watchstrap 200 and conductive traces 240 may be carried on and/or in the at least one flexible printed circuit board. Stretchable printed circuit boards may be employed, such as those described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/872,569 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/471,982), which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. Elastic conductors may be employed. In some implementations, watchstrap 200 may essentially comprise a flexible printed circuit board that is formed of bio-compatible material. In implementations in which an enhanced watchstrap is formed of a set of rigid or semi-rigid links that are adaptively coupled together by at least one adaptive coupler, at least one rigid or semi-rigid link may comprise and/or include at least one rigid printed circuit board that carries communication pathways.
A person of skill in the art will appreciate that watchstrap 200 includes one type of contact sensor 221, 222 and six components 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, and 236, though in practice an enhanced watchstrap may carry any number of components (including more or fewer than six components) and any number or type of sensors depending on the functionality provided by the watchstrap.
Enhanced watchstrap 200 may be integrated into any known wristwatch design by substituting for the existing strap or band in the design and, optionally, communicatively coupling to circuitry in the existing design (if such circuitry exists) through communication terminal 236.
Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “rigid” as in, for example, “substantially rigid material,” is used to describe a material that has an inherent tendency to maintain its shape and resist malformation/deformation under the moderate stresses and strains typically encountered by a wearable electronic device.
The various embodiments of enhanced watchstraps described herein are generic in that they can be adapted to integrate with any known wristwatch design (including traditional watches and smart watches) by, for example, sizing and dimensioning the watchstrap to mate with existing wristwatch components (such as the housing or clock face display) and, optionally, communicatively coupling the electrical components of the watchstrap to existing electrical components of the wristwatch (if such circuitry exists) through a dedicated communication terminal (e.g., terminal 236). In this way, the enhanced straps described herein introduce new components and associated functionality/capability into existing wristwatch designs, thereby transforming virtually any traditional wristwatch design into a smart watch and/or enhancing the functions and capabilities of virtually any smart watch design. In implementations in which an enhanced watchstrap is not communicatively coupled to electrical components of a wristwatch (i.e., in implementations in which communication terminal 236 is not used), the enhanced watchstraps described herein may still communicate with other devices (such as a smartphone, computer, etc.) wirelessly (e.g., using communication terminal 235) and thereby provide enhanced, smart watch-like functionality in an otherwise non-smart watch design.
The present systems, articles, and methods may employ the systems, articles, and methods for processing EMG sensor data described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/768,322 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/186,889), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/869,526 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/465,194), and/or U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/874,846 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/476,093), each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. In the case of contact sensors that are not EMG sensors (e.g., single-frequency capacitive touch sensors and/or multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors), the systems, articles, and methods of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. Nos. 61/768,322 (now Ser. No. 14/186,889), 61/869,526 (now Ser. No. 14/465,194), and/or 61/874,846 (now Ser. No. 14/476,093) may be readily adapted to accommodate non-EMG based contact sensor data.
As previously described, contact sensors and associated circuitry may be on-board or otherwise packaged with a watch housing back-plate, either on its own or in conjunction with contact sensors packaged with a watchstrap as described in FIGS. 1, 2A, and 2B. For example, the various embodiments described herein provide systems, articles, and methods for generic wristwatch back-plates that may be adapted to fit to any known wristwatch design and incorporated into virtually any wristwatch during manufacturing thereof. The back-plates described herein incorporate various types of contact sensors and thereby enhance the functions and/or capabilities of the wristwatch with which they are integrated. In this way, the back-plates described herein can add sensing and/or other capabilities to “traditional” watch designs (i.e., non-smart watch designs) to effectively transform the traditional watch into a smart watch, and/or the back-plates described herein can add new sensing and/or other capabilities to smart watch designs.
FIG. 3 is a perspective view of an exemplary wristwatch 300 that includes an enhanced back-plate 312 in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Wristwatch 300 includes a wristband 301 that enwraps the wrist of a user to secure wristwatch 300 in position on the user's wrist. Wristband 301 may be elastic, fabric, cloth, leather, or formed of serially-coupled links or any other flexible material and may or may not include a latch, clasp, or other fastening device (not shown in FIG. 3). Wristband 301 may be a traditional watchstrap or an enhanced watchstrap such as watchstrap 101 from FIG. 1, watchstrap 200 from FIGS. 2A and 2B, and/or an enhanced watchstrap as described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/891,694, which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. Wristwatch 300 also includes a housing 310 having a top surface 311 and an enhanced back-plate 312 in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Top surface 311 includes a window or display that may provide a means of conveying information to a user (such as the time, etc.) and/or an interface through which the user may program and/or control functions of wristwatch 300. For example, wristwatch 300 may be a traditional analog or mechanical watch, in which case the display of top surface 311 may include a simple sheet of transparent material such as glass or plastic (commonly referred to as the “crystal”) forming a window through which the hands of an analog watch face may be seen by the user, or wristwatch 300 may be a traditional digital watch, in which case the display of top surface 311 may include a digital display screen, or wristwatch 300 may be a smart watch, in which case the display of top surface 311 may include a touchscreen. Wristwatch 300 may be substantially similar to any known wristwatch except that wristwatch 300 includes enhanced back-plate 312 providing additional functions and/or capabilities in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods.
FIG. 4 is a plan view showing an underside of a wristwatch 400 and thereby providing a clearer view (compared to the perspective view of FIG. 3) of a back-plate 412 that is enhanced in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Wristwatch 400 is substantially similar to wristwatch 300 from FIG. 3 and includes a wristband 401 (similar to wristband 301 from FIG. 3) and a housing 410 (similar to housing 310 from FIG. 3). As FIG. 4 depicts the underside of housing 410, the top surface of housing 410 is not visible in FIG. 4. The top surface of housing 410 may include a window or display, (e.g., an electronic display screen with or without a touchscreen) as seen in virtually all known wristwatch designs.
In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, a back-plate for integration with a wristwatch may include at least one contact sensor, and thereby provide enhanced functionality/capability for the wristwatch. Enhanced back-plate 412 includes contact sensors 421 and 422. Contact sensors 421 and 422 may include, for example, EMG sensors, single-frequency capacitive touch sensors, multi-frequency capacitive touch sensors, magnetomyography sensors, acoustic myography sensors, electrocardiography sensors, blood pressure sensors, one or more skin conductance sensor(s), and/or generally any type or types of biometric sensor(s) that are responsive to signals detected through physical contact with the user's skin. In any case, at least one contact sensor (421, 422) is positioned on a first surface of back-plate 412 (i.e., the surface of back-plate 412 that corresponds to the underside of housing 410 in wristwatch 400, hereafter the “contact surface”) so that the at least one contact sensor (421, 422) may be positioned proximate (e.g., in physical contact with) the skin of the user.
Back-plate 412 may be sized and dimensioned to mate with any wristwatch design to provide a back-plate therefor and/or an underside thereof. For example, back-plate 412 is illustrated in FIG. 4 as having a substantially square geometry with rounded corners, while in other implementations back-plate 412 may be adapted to provide other geometries, including but not limited to: substantially square, substantially rectangular, substantially circular, and substantially polygonal. Back-plate 412 may be substantially planar (i.e., flat) or, as illustrated in wristwatch 300 of FIG. 3, back-plate 412 may be curved to better accommodate the shape of a user's wrist. In the case of back-plate 412 being curved, a two-dimensional projection of the geometry of back-plate 412 (as seen, for example, in the plan view of FIG. 4) may be any shape designed to accommodate the specifications of a particular wristwatch, including but not limited to: substantially square, substantially rectangular, substantially circular, and substantially polygonal.
The plan view of FIG. 4 depicts the underside of housing 410 in order to show the contact surface of back-plate 412 which carries contact sensors 421 and 422. Back-plate 412 mates with a top surface of housing 410 (either directly, or by mating with at least one sidewall that provides physical coupling between back-plate 412 and a top surface of housing 410) to form a volume having a hollow inner cavity. Additional components of wristwatch 400 (such as, for example, gears, circuitry, a quartz oscillator, a digital processor, and so on) may be included in this inner cavity. In some embodiments, additional components may be carried on a second surface of back-plate 412 that is opposite the first surface (i.e., a “non-contact surface” of back-plate 412 that is at least partially contained within the cavity and does not physically contact the user's skin when worn), such that the additional components carried on the non-contact surface of back-plate 412 are contained in the cavity of housing 410.
FIG. 5 is a perspective view of a back-plate 500 for integration into a wristwatch in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Back-plate 500 comprises a plate of substantially rigid material having a first surface (i.e., a “contact surface”) 501 and a second surface (i.e., a “non-contact surface”) 502 opposite the contact surface. The contact surface 501 forms the underside of a housing (e.g., housing 310 from FIG. 3 or 410 from FIG. 4) when integrated into a wristwatch and may be immediately proximate (e.g., in physical contact with) the user's skin during use. In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, contact surface 501 includes at least one contact sensor 520 (or at least, an electrode thereof), shown in dotted lines in FIG. 5 to indicate that this component is not actually visible in the view of FIG. 5. The non-contact surface 502 of back-plate 500 carries multiple components 531, 532, 533, and 534, which may take on a variety of different forms depending on the specific implementation. In general, component 531 represents circuitry (e.g., electrical and/or electronic). Circuitry 531 is communicatively coupled to contact sensor 520 by, e.g., an electrically conductive path that extends through back-plate 500. Circuitry 531 may include various circuits, including but not limited to: filtering circuits, amplification circuits, analog-to-digital conversion circuits, routing circuits, and so on. Components 532, 533 and 534 may each include any or all of, for example: a pedometer, an inertial sensor such as an accelerometer and/or a gyroscope, a compass, a GPS unit, a wireless transmitter (on its own or as part of a wireless transceiver) such as Bluetooth™, WiFi™, and/or NFC™, a tethered connector port such as USB, micro-USB, pins or sockets, a battery, a digital processor, and/or an inductive charging element. In applications where one of components 532, 533, and 534 is a wireless transmitter, data may be transmitted from back-plate 500 (e.g., data provided by contact sensor 520) to any receiving device, such as to a smartphone, laptop computer, tablet computer, or desktop computer. At least one of components 532 and/or 533 may include a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium that stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by a processor (e.g., either a processor on-board back-plate 500, for example, component 533, or a processor in a smart watch with which back-plate 500 is integrated through, for example, a tethered connector port), cause the processor to process signals provided by contact sensor 520.
Components 531, 532, 533, and 534 may include at least one of a tethered connector port for communicatively coupling to at least one electrical or electronic component of a wristwatch (e.g., at least one port for galvanically electrically coupling to one or components of the wristwatch with which back-plate 500 is integrated (i.e., components not carried by back-plate 500)) and/or a wireless transmitter (e.g., wireless transceiver) for transmitting data provided by the at least one contact sensor 520 to at least one receiving device, such as a smartphone or other computer. In either case, at least one of components 531, 532, 533, and 534 provides a means through which data provided by the at least one contact sensor 520 is transmitted to a data processing system (either on-board or separate from back-plate 500 or the wristwatch with which back-plate 500 is integrated) for processing, analysis, and/or storage. In the case of components 531, 532, 533, and 534 including a wireless transmitter and no tethered connector port for galvanically interfacing with one or more other components of the wristwatch with which back-plate 500 is integrated, back-plate 500 and all components thereof (i.e., contact sensor 520 and components 531, 532, 533, and 534) may be communicatively isolated from all components of the wristwatch with which back-plate 500 is integrated.
A person of skill in the art will appreciate that FIG. 5 shows four components 531, 532, 533, and 534 on the second “non-contact” surface 502 of back-plate 500, though in practice a back-plate may carry any number of components (including more or fewer than four components) depending on the functionality provided by the back-plate.
As back-plate 500 is designed to be integrated into a wristwatch (e.g., as a component of the wristwatch integrated into the wristwatch during manufacturing thereof), the non-contact surface 502 of back-plate 500 may include a communication terminal 534 (such as a tethered connector port) to communicatively couple with other electrical and/or electronic circuitry of the wristwatch. For example, communication terminal 534 may communicatively couple with an electronic display screen (e.g., a touchscreen) of the wristwatch and/or communication terminal 534 may communicatively couple with any electrical component contained within the cavity of the housing of the wristwatch. Communication terminal 534 may include any type of electrical or optical connector, including but not limited to a zero insertion force connector, a socket, a set of pins or bonding pads, a micro-USB connector, and so on. Thus, back-plate 500 may be integrated into any known wristwatch design by substituting for the existing back-plate in the design and, optionally, communicatively coupling to circuitry in the existing design (if such circuitry does exist) through communication terminal 534.
The various embodiments of wristwatch back-plates described herein are generic in that they can be adapted to integrate with any known wristwatch design by, for example, sizing and dimensioning the plate to mate with existing wristwatch components (such as the display window or screen with/without associated sidewalls) and, optionally, communicatively coupling the electrical components of the back-plate to existing electrical components of the wristwatch (if such electrical components exist) through a dedicated communication terminal (e.g., terminal 534). In this way, the enhanced back-plates described herein introduce new components and associated functionality/capability into existing wristwatch designs, thereby transforming virtually any traditional wristwatch design into a smart watch and/or enhancing the functions and capabilities of virtually any smart watch design.
As previously described, in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods at least one contact sensor may be incorporated into a wearable device that otherwise provides some other functionality (such as a wristwatch) or into a dedicated wearable electronic device that is specifically designed to provide contact sensing functionality. For example, a wearable electronic device may be fitted with multiple EMG sensors that are responsive to muscle activity for the purpose of enabling gesture-based control in a human-electronics interface as described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/752,226 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/155,107), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/857,105 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/335,668), and/or U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/860,063 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/276,575), each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety, and/or in any of the other US Provisional Patent Applications incorporated by reference herein. In accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods, such a wearable EMG device may be adapted to include at least one capacitive touch sensor, such as at least one single-frequency capacitive touch sensor and/or at least one multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor.
FIG. 6 is a perspective view of an exemplary wearable EMG device 600 that includes two contact sensor types: a set of capacitive EMG sensors 610 (only two called out to reduce clutter) and at least one capacitive touch sensor 670 in accordance with the present systems, articles, and methods. Exemplary wearable EMG device 600 may, for example, form part of a human-electronics interface. Exemplary wearable EMG device 600 is an armband designed to be worn on the forearm of a user, though a person of skill in the art will appreciate that the teachings described herein may readily be applied in wearable EMG devices designed to be worn elsewhere on the body of the user, including without limitation: on the upper arm, wrist, hand, finger, leg, foot, torso, or neck of the user.
Device 600 includes a set of eight pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 that form physically coupled links of the wearable EMG device 600. Each pod structure in the set of eight pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 is positioned adjacent and in between two other pod structures in the set of eight pod structures such that the set of pod structures forms a perimeter of an annular or closed loop configuration. For example, pod structure 601 is positioned adjacent and in between pod structures 602 and 608 at least approximately on a perimeter of the annular or closed loop configuration of pod structures, pod structure 602 is positioned adjacent and in between pod structures 601 and 603 at least approximately on the perimeter of the annular or closed loop configuration, pod structure 603 is positioned adjacent and in between pod structures 602 and 604 at least approximately on the perimeter of the annular or closed loop configuration, and so on. Each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 is physically coupled to the two adjacent pod structures by at least one adaptive coupler (not visible in FIG. 6). For example, pod structure 601 is physically coupled to pod structure 608 by an adaptive coupler and to pod structure 602 by an adaptive coupler. As described previously, the term “adaptive coupler” is used throughout this specification and the appended claims to denote a system, article or device that provides flexible, adjustable, modifiable, extendable, extensible, or otherwise “adaptive” physical coupling. Adaptive coupling is physical coupling between two objects that permits limited motion of the two objects relative to one another. An example of an adaptive coupler is an elastic material such as an elastic band. Thus, each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 in the set of eight pod structures may be adaptively physically coupled to the two adjacent pod structures by at least one elastic band. The set of eight pod structures may be physically bound in the annular or closed loop configuration by a single elastic band that couples over or through all pod structures or by multiple separate elastic bands that couple between adjacent pairs of pod structures or between groups of adjacent pairs of pod structures. Device 600 is depicted in FIG. 6 with the at least one adaptive coupler completely retracted and contained within the eight pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 (and therefore the at least one adaptive coupler is not visible in FIG. 6).
Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “pod structure” is used to refer to an individual link, segment, pod, section, structure, component, etc. of a wearable EMG device. For the purposes of the present systems, articles, and methods, an “individual link, segment, pod, section, structure, component, etc.” (i.e., a “pod structure”) of a wearable EMG device is characterized by its ability to be moved or displaced relative to another link, segment, pod, section, structure component, etc. of the wearable EMG device. For example, pod structures 601 and 602 of device 600 can each be moved or displaced relative to one another within the constraints imposed by the adaptive coupler providing adaptive physical coupling therebetween. The desire for pod structures 601 and 602 to be movable/displaceable relative to one another specifically arises because device 600 is a wearable EMG device that advantageously accommodates the movements of a user and/or different user forms.
Device 600 includes eight pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 that form physically coupled links thereof. Wearable EMG devices employing pod structures (e.g., device 600) are used herein as exemplary wearable EMG device designs, while the present systems, articles, and methods may be applied to wearable EMG devices that do not employ pod structures (or that employ any number of pod structures). Thus, throughout this specification, descriptions relating to pod structures (e.g., functions and/or components of pod structures) should be interpreted as being applicable to any wearable EMG device design, even wearable EMG device designs that do not employ pod structures (except in cases where a pod structure is specifically recited in a claim).
In exemplary device 600 of FIG. 6, each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 comprises a respective housing having a respective inner volume. Each housing may be formed of substantially rigid material and may be optically opaque. As previously described, throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “rigid” as in, for example, “substantially rigid material,” is used to describe a material that has an inherent tendency to maintain or restore its shape and resist malformation/deformation under the moderate stresses and strains typically encountered by a wearable electronic device.
Details of the components contained within the housings (i.e., within the inner volumes of the housings) of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 are not visible in FIG. 6. To facilitate descriptions of exemplary device 600, some internal components are depicted by dashed lines in FIG. 6 to indicate that these components are contained in the inner volume(s) of housings and may not normally be actually visible in the view depicted in FIG. 6, unless a transparent or translucent material is employed to form the housings. For example, any or all of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and/or 608 may include circuitry (i.e., electrical and/or electronic circuitry). In FIG. 6, a first pod structure 601 is shown containing circuitry 611 (i.e., circuitry 611 is contained in the inner volume of the housing of pod structure 601), a second pod structure 602 is shown containing circuitry 612, and a third pod structure 608 is shown containing circuitry 618. The circuitry in any or all pod structures may be communicatively coupled to the circuitry in at least one adjacent pod structure by at least one respective communicative pathway (e.g., by at least one electrically conductive pathway and/or by at least one optical pathway). For example, FIG. 6 shows a first set of communicative pathways 621 providing communicative coupling between circuitry 618 of pod structure 608 and circuitry 611 of pod structure 601, and a second set of communicative pathways 622 providing communicative coupling between circuitry 611 of pod structure 601 and circuitry 612 of pod structure 602. Communicative coupling between circuitries of adjacent pod structures in device 600 may advantageously include systems, articles, and methods for signal routing as described in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/866,960 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/461,044), which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
Each individual pod structure within a wearable EMG device may perform a particular function, or particular functions. For example, in device 600, each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, and 607 includes a respective contact sensor 610 or 670; thus, each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, and 607 may be referred to as a respective “sensor pod.” Device 600 employs at least two different types of contact sensors: capacitive EMG sensors 610 and at least one capacitive touch sensor 670. In the illustrated example, sensor pods 601, 602, 603, 604, 606, and 607 each include a respective capacitive EMG sensor 610 responsive to (e.g., to detect) muscle activity of a user that provides electrical signals in response to detected muscle activity, while sensor pod 605 includes a capacitive touch sensor 670 (e.g., a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor or a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor) responsive to (e.g., to detect) physical contact between a user and an object (i.e., when and/or how a user is physically touching an object) and that provides signals in response to detected physical contact. Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “sensor pod” is used to denote an individual pod structure that includes at least one contact sensor.
Pod structure 608 of device 600 includes a processor 630 that processes the signals provided by the contact sensors 610 and 670 of sensor pods 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, and 607. Pod structure 608 may therefore be referred to as a “processor pod.” Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “processor pod” is used to denote an individual pod structure that includes at least one processor to process signals. The processor may be any type of processor, including but not limited to: a digital microprocessor or microcontroller, an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field-programmable gate array (FPGA), a digital signal processor (DSP), a graphics processing unit (GPU), a programmable gate array (PGA), a programmable logic unit (PLU), or the like, that analyzes or otherwise processes the signals to determine at least one output, action, or function based on the signals. A person of skill in the art will appreciate that implementations that employ a digital processor (e.g., a digital microprocessor or microcontroller, a DSP, etc.) may advantageously include a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium or memory 640 communicatively coupled thereto and storing processor-executable instructions that control the operations thereof, whereas implementations that employ an ASIC, FPGA, or analog processor may or may not include a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium.
As used throughout this specification and the appended claims, the terms “sensor pod” and “processor pod” are not necessarily exclusive. A single pod structure may satisfy the definitions of both a “sensor pod” and a “processor pod” and may be referred to as either type of pod structure. For greater clarity, the term “sensor pod” is used to refer to any pod structure that includes a contact sensor and performs at least the function(s) of a sensor pod, and the term processor pod is used to refer to any pod structure that includes a processor and performs at least the function(s) of a processor pod. In device 600, processor pod 608 includes a capacitive EMG sensor 610 (not visible in FIG. 6) to sense, measure, transduce or otherwise detect muscle activity of a user, so processor pod 608 could be referred to as a sensor pod. However, in exemplary device 600, processor pod 608 is the only pod structure that includes a processor 630, thus processor pod 608 is the only pod structure in exemplary device 600 that can be referred to as a processor pod. The processor 630 in processor pod 608 also processes the EMG signals provided by the capacitive EMG sensor 610 of processor pod 608. In alternative embodiments of device 600, multiple pod structures may include processors, and thus multiple pod structures may serve as processor pods. Similarly, some pod structures may not include contact sensors, and/or some contact sensors and/or processors may be laid out in other configurations that do not involve pod structures.
In device 600, processor 630 includes and/or is communicatively coupled to a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium or memory 640. Memory 640 stores at least two sets of processor-executable instructions: processor-executable gesture identification instructions 641 that, when executed by processor 630, cause processor 630 to process the EMG signals from capacitive EMG sensors 610 and identify a gesture to which the EMG signals correspond, and processor-executable touch sensing instructions 642 that, when executed by processor 630, cause processor 630 to process the signals from the at least one capacitive touch sensor 670. For communicating with a separate electronic device (not shown), wearable EMG device 600 includes at least one communication terminal. As examples, device 600 includes a first communication terminal 651 and a second communication terminal 652. First communication terminal 651 includes a wireless transmitter (i.e., a wireless communication terminal) and second communication terminal 652 includes a tethered connector port 652. Wireless transmitter 651 may include, for example, a Bluetooth® transmitter (or similar) and connector port 652 may include a Universal Serial Bus port, a mini-Universal Serial Bus port, a micro-Universal Serial Bus port, a SMA port, a THUNDERBOLT® port, or the like.
For some applications, device 600 may also include at least one inertial sensor 660 (e.g., an inertial measurement unit, or “IMU,” that includes at least one accelerometer and/or at least one gyroscope) responsive to (e.g., to detect, sense, or measure) motion effected by a user and that provides signals in response to detected motion. Signals provided by inertial sensor 660 may be combined or otherwise processed in conjunction with signals provided by capacitive EMG sensors 610 and/or capacitive touch sensor(s) 670.
Throughout this specification and the appended claims, the term “provide” and variants such as “provided” and “providing” are frequently used in the context of signals. For example, a contact sensor is described as “providing at least one signal” and an inertial sensor is described as “providing at least one signal.” Unless the specific context requires otherwise, the term “provide” is used in a most general sense to cover any form of providing a signal, including but not limited to: relaying a signal, outputting a signal, generating a signal, routing a signal, creating a signal, transducing a signal, and so on. For example, a capacitive EMG sensor may include at least one electrode that capacitively couples to electrical signals from muscle activity. This capacitive coupling induces a change in a charge or electrical potential of the at least one electrode which is then relayed through the sensor circuitry and output, or “provided,” by the sensor. Thus, the capacitive EMG sensor may “provide” an electrical signal by relaying an electrical signal from a muscle (or muscles) to an output (or outputs). In contrast, an inertial sensor may include components (e.g., piezoelectric, piezoresistive, capacitive, etc.) that are used to convert physical motion into electrical signals. The inertial sensor may “provide” an electrical signal by detecting motion and generating an electrical signal in response to the motion.
As previously described, each of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 may include circuitry (i.e., electrical and/or electronic circuitry). FIG. 6 depicts circuitry 611 inside the inner volume of sensor pod 601, circuitry 612 inside the inner volume of sensor pod 602, and circuitry 618 inside the inner volume of processor pod 618. The circuitry in any or all of pod structures 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607 and 608 (including circuitries 611, 612, and 618) may include any or all of: an amplification circuit to amplify electrical signals provided by at least one contact sensor 610, 670; a filtering circuit to remove unwanted signal frequencies from the signals provided by at least one contact sensor 610, 670; and/or an analog-to-digital conversion circuit to convert analog signals into digital signals. Device 600 may also include at least one battery (not shown in FIG. 6) to provide a portable power source for device 600.
Signals that are provided by contact sensors 610, 670 in device 600 are routed to processor pod 608 for processing by processor 630. To this end, device 600 employs a set of communicative pathways (e.g., 621 and 622) to route the signals that are output by sensor pods 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, and 607 to processor pod 608. Each respective pod structure 601, 602, 603, 604, 605, 606, 607, and 608 in device 600 is communicatively coupled to, over, or through at least one of the two other pod structures between which the respective pod structure is positioned by at least one respective communicative pathway from the set of communicative pathways. Each communicative pathway (e.g., 621 and 622) may be realized in any communicative form, including but not limited to: electrically conductive wires or cables, ribbon cables, fiber-optic cables, optical/photonic waveguides, electrically conductive traces carried by a rigid printed circuit board, electrically conductive traces carried by a flexible printed circuit board, and/or electrically conductive traces carried by a stretchable printed circuit board.
Device 600 from FIG. 6 represents an example of a wearable EMG device that incorporates at least one capacitive touch sensor 670 (e.g., at least one single-frequency capacitive touch sensor and/or at least one multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor) in accordance with the teachings of the present systems, articles, and methods, though the teachings of the present systems, articles, and methods are applicable to any wearable electronic device. In most applications, it is advantageous for the wearable device to include an on-board processor for processing contact sensor signals as described herein, but a person of skill in the art will appreciate that at least some of the acts involved in processing contact sensor signals may be performed by a processor that is separate from the wearable device (e.g., a processor in a computer that receives signals from the wearable device).
As previously described, incorporating at least one capacitive touch sensor into a wearable device (such as a wristwatch of a wearable EMG device) can enable the device to detect physical contact between a user and an object (i.e., when and/or how a user is physically interacting with an object) and to provide signals in response to the detected physical contact. Furthermore, at least two capacitive touch sensors worn on different parts of the user's body (e.g., in a first wearable device, such as a wearable EMG device, worn on a first arm of the user and a second wearable device, such as a wristwatch or a second wearable EMG device, worn on a second arm of the user) can be used to detect poses, postures, gestures, and/or other configurations performed by the user as described in Sato et al. Such poses, postures, gestures, and/or other configurations detected by at least two capacitive touch sensors worn on different parts of the user's body (similar to, for example, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/874,846; now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/476,093) may facilitate gesture identification and/or expand the library of gestures available to a user in, for example, a human-electronics interface employing gesture-based control.
The above description of illustrated embodiments, including what is described in the Abstract, is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the embodiments to the precise forms disclosed. Although specific embodiments of and examples are described herein for illustrative purposes, various equivalent modifications can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the disclosure, as will be recognized by those skilled in the relevant art. The teachings provided herein of the various embodiments can be applied to other portable and/or wearable electronic devices, not necessarily the exemplary wearable electronic devices generally described above.
For instance, the foregoing detailed description has set forth various embodiments of the devices and/or processes via the use of block diagrams, schematics, and examples. Insofar as such block diagrams, schematics, and examples contain one or more functions and/or operations, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that each function and/or operation within such block diagrams, flowcharts, or examples can be implemented, individually and/or collectively, by a wide range of hardware, software, firmware, or virtually any combination thereof. In one embodiment, the present subject matter may be implemented via Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs). However, those skilled in the art will recognize that the embodiments disclosed herein, in whole or in part, can be equivalently implemented in standard integrated circuits, as one or more computer programs executed by one or more computers (e.g., as one or more programs running on one or more computer systems), as one or more programs executed by on one or more controllers (e.g., microcontrollers) as one or more programs executed by one or more processors (e.g., microprocessors, central processing units, graphical processing units), as firmware, or as virtually any combination thereof, and that designing the circuitry and/or writing the code for the software and or firmware would be well within the skill of one of ordinary skill in the art in light of the teachings of this disclosure.
When logic is implemented as software and stored in memory, logic or information can be stored on any processor-readable medium for use by or in connection with any processor-related system or method. In the context of this disclosure, a memory is a processor-readable medium that is an electronic, magnetic, optical, or other physical device or means that contains or stores a computer and/or processor program. Logic and/or the information can be embodied in any processor-readable medium for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device, such as a computer-based system, processor-containing system, or other system that can fetch the instructions from the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device and execute the instructions associated with logic and/or information.
In the context of this specification, a “non-transitory processor-readable medium” can be any element that can store the program associated with logic and/or information for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, and/or device. The processor-readable medium can be, for example, but is not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus or device. More specific examples (a non-exhaustive list) of the computer readable medium would include the following: a portable computer diskette (magnetic, compact flash card, secure digital, or the like), a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM, EEPROM, or Flash memory), a portable compact disc read-only memory (CDROM), digital tape, and other non-transitory media.
The various embodiments described above can be combined to provide further embodiments. To the extent that they are not inconsistent with the specific teachings and definitions herein, all of the U.S. patents, U.S. patent application publications, U.S. patent applications, foreign patents, foreign patent applications and non-patent publications referred to in this specification and/or listed in the Application Data Sheet, including but not limited to U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/897,097, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/752,226 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/155,107), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/768,322 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/186,889), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/771,500 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/194,252), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/857,105 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/335,668), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/860,063 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/276,575), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/866,960 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/461,044), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/869,526 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/465,194), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/874,846 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/476,093), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/872,569 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/471,982), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/881,064 (now U.S. Non-Provisional patent application Ser. No. 14/494,274), U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/894,263, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/887,193, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/887,812, and U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/891,694, are incorporated herein by reference, in their entirety. Aspects of the embodiments can be modified, if necessary, to employ systems, circuits and concepts of the various patents, applications and publications to provide yet further embodiments.
These and other changes can be made to the embodiments in light of the above-detailed description. In general, in the following claims, the terms used should not be construed to limit the claims to the specific embodiments disclosed in the specification and the claims, but should be construed to include all possible embodiments along with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled. Accordingly, the claims are not limited by the disclosure.

Claims

1. A wristwatch comprising:

a housing having a top surface that includes a display and an inner cavity that includes a timekeeping device; and

a watchstrap that is flexible and carries a set of components and a set of communication pathways, the watchstrap physically coupled to the housing, wherein the set of components includes at least one contact sensor and at least one communication terminal, and wherein the at least one communication terminal is communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways.

2. The wristwatch of claim 1 wherein the set of components carried by the watchstrap includes:

a digital processor communicatively coupled in between the at least one contact sensor and the communication terminal; and

a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the digital processor, and wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.

3. The wristwatch of claim 1 wherein the at least one contact sensor is carried on a first surface of the watchstrap, the first surface in physical contact with a user when the watchstrap is worn around a wrist of the user, and wherein the set of components carried by the watchstrap includes at least one of:

a component that is carried on a second surface of the watchstrap, the second surface opposite the first surface; and/or

a component that is carried within the watchstrap.

4. The wristwatch of claim 1 wherein the at least one contact sensor includes at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor.

5. A watchstrap for integration into a wristwatch, the watchstrap comprising:

a flexible strap that is sized and dimensioned to mate with a wristwatch housing;

a set of communication pathways carried by the strap; and

a set of components carried by the strap, the set of components including at least one contact sensor and at least one communication terminal, wherein the at least one communication terminal is communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor by at least one communication pathway in the set of communication pathways.

6. The watchstrap of claim 5 wherein the set of components carried by the strap further includes:

a digital processor communicatively coupled in between the at least one contact sensor and the at least one communication terminal; and

a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the digital processor, wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.

7. The watchstrap of claim 5 wherein the at least one contact sensor includes at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor.

8. The watchstrap of claim 5 wherein the strap includes a first surface and a second surface, and wherein:

at least one component in the set of components carried by the strap is carried on the first surface of the strap; and

at least one component in the set of components carried by the strap is carried on the second surface of the strap and/or at least one component in the set of components carried by the strap is carried within the strap.

9. A wristwatch comprising:

a wristband;

a housing physically coupled to the wristband, the housing comprising:

a top surface that includes a display; and

a back-plate formed of a substantially rigid material and positioned underneath the top surface, wherein the back-plate and the top surface together define a cavity therebetween, and wherein the back-plate includes a first surface that carries at least one contact sensor and a second surface that carries circuitry, the second surface opposite the first surface and the circuitry contained within the cavity and communicatively coupled to the at least one contact sensor; and

a digital processor contained within the cavity, the digital processor communicatively coupled to the circuitry.

10. The wristwatch of claim 9 wherein the wristwatch includes a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium contained within the cavity, and wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by the digital processor, cause the digital processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.

11. The wristwatch of claim 9 wherein the at least one contact sensor includes at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor.

12. The wristwatch of claim 9 wherein the circuitry carried by the second surface of the back-plate is communicatively isolated from the display, and wherein the circuitry carried by the second surface of the back-plate includes the digital processor and a wireless transmitter communicatively coupled to the digital processor.

13. A back-plate for integration into a wristwatch, the back-plate comprising:

a plate of substantially rigid material that is sized and dimensioned to mate with a wristwatch housing and to provide an underside thereof;

at least one contact sensor carried on a first side of the plate;

circuitry carried on a second side of the plate, the second side opposite the first side, wherein the at least one contact sensor is communicatively coupled to the circuitry; and

at least one component selected from the group consisting of:

a tethered connector port communicatively coupled to the circuitry, the tethered connector port to in use communicatively couple to at least one electrical or electronic component of a wristwatch; and

a wireless transmitter communicatively coupled to the circuitry, the wireless transmitter to in use wirelessly transmit data provided by the at least one contact sensor.

14. The back-plate of claim 13, further comprising:

a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium carried on the second side of the plate, wherein the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium stores processor-executable contact sensing instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to process signals received from the at least one contact sensor.

15. The back-plate of claim 14, further comprising:

a digital processor carried on the second side of the plate and communicatively coupled to both the circuitry and the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium.

16. The back-plate of claim 13 wherein the at least one contact sensor includes at least one capacitive biometric sensor selected from the group consisting of: an electromyography sensor, a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor, and a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor.

17. A wearable electronic device comprising:

at least one electromyography (“EMG”) sensor responsive to muscle activity corresponding to a gesture performed by a user of the wearable electronic device and to provide signals in response thereto;

at least one capacitive touch sensor responsive to physical contact between the user and an object and to provide signals in response thereto;

a processor communicatively coupled to the at least one EMG sensor and to the at least one capacitive touch sensor; and

a non-transitory processor-readable storage medium communicatively coupled to the processor, the non-transitory processor-readable storage medium storing:

processor-executable gesture identification instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to identify a gesture performed by the user based at least in part on signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor; and

processor-executable touch sensing instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to process signals provided by the at least one capacitive touch sensor.

18. The wearable electronic device of claim 17 wherein the at least one capacitive touch sensor includes at least one capacitive touch sensor selected from the group consisting of: a single-frequency capacitive touch sensor; a multi-frequency capacitive touch sensor; and a swept frequency capacitive touch sensor.

19. The wearable electronic device of claim 17, further comprising:

at least one communication terminal communicatively coupled to the processor, the at least one communication terminal to transmit signals to a receiving device, wherein the signals are based on at least one of: signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor and/or signals provided by the at least one capacitive touch sensor.

20. The wearable electronic device of claim 17, further comprising:

at least one inertial sensor communicatively coupled to the processor, the at least one inertial sensor responsive to motion corresponding to the gesture performed by the user of the wearable electronic device and to provide at least one signal in response thereto, wherein the processor-executable gesture identification instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to identify the gesture performed by the user based at least in part on signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor cause the processor to identify the gesture performed by the user based at least in part on both signals provided by the at least one EMG sensor and at least one signal provided by the at least one inertial sensor.