Wi-Fi at home can do things you never dreamed of

Most people think of Wi-Fi as surfing the Internet, even though several studies prove that it is okay to think of it in other ways. Recently, for example, Italian researchers came up with a solution that can essentially identify anyone using the Wi-Fi signal, which raises a minimum of data protection problems. And now engineers from the University of California have shown that it is worth looking at wireless technology from a different perspective.

Scientists have developed a system that can put ordinary wireless signals at the service of medicine. The concept shows that simple, everyday Wi-Fi adapters can measure heart rate with clinical-level accuracy without the need for a smart watch, chest strap or hospital monitor.

The technology, called Pulse-Fi, uses inexpensive hardware already found in homes and workplaces. The experts’ solution was to use machine learning to detect the heartbeat using small changes in the signals, all while filtering out background noise, such as interference from movement or the environment.

The researchers tested the system on 118 participants and obtained results almost identical to those obtained with conventional medical equipment. After only five seconds of signal processing, the Pulse-Fi measured heart rate with an error margin of half a beat per minute. Longer monitoring further improved accuracy regardless of whether participants were sitting, standing, lying down or walking. It’s about the results IEEE Xplore-in were reported.

https://hvg.hu/tudomany/20250818_wifi8-szabvany-halozat-internet-stabilitas

Heart rate is one of the most basic measures of health, changing with stress, hydration and fitness. Its monitoring typically requires some kind of medical device or wearable device, which means that wireless measurement is not yet possible. Pulse-Fi suggests a future where WiFi routers can also function as healthcare devices.

When the Wi-Fi signal hits some physical obstacle, namely the human body, part of it is absorbed and the other part is scattered by it. A heartbeat causes subtle but detectable changes in these signals. Pulse-Fi’s algorithms learned to recognize these discrepancies using training based on real-world data collected with standard pulse oximeters.

During the investigation, the team took special care to work with cheap equipment. The price of the used ESP32 chip ranges from 5 to 10 dollars (1,600 to 3,300 forints), and the also used Raspberry Pi cost 30 dollars (approx. 10,000 forints). The system proved to be relatively accurate even with these cheap devices, so commercial routers could certainly give even more accurate results.

The team is already working on expanding the system, which could thus also be suitable for tracking the breathing rate, so conditions such as sleep apnea could be diagnosed.

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