Major research collaboration will improve British athletes’ performance on world stage

Imperial and partners launch £8.5 million sporting initiative <em>- News Release</em>

For Immediate Release
Tuesday 27 October 2009

*** Members of the media are invited to see a demonstration of some of the new sensor technology described below in action - please contact Colin Smith for further information ***

Scientists are developing a range of miniaturised wearable and track-side sensors, computer modelling tools and smart training devices to help British athletes improve their performance on the world stage, as part of a new £8.5 million project that will be officially launched tomorrow (28 October 2009).

The Elite Sport Performance Research in Training with Pervasive Sensing (ESPRIT) project is funded by the EPSRC and is led by Imperial College London in partnership with UK Sport and supported by Queen Mary University of London and Loughborough University. It involves researchers from the three universities working alongside British athletes via UK Sport’s Research and Innovation programme.

The researchers are devising miniature wearable sensors that will monitor different aspects of athletes’ physiological performance, in order to monitor and optimise training for competitive performance. The sensors will include wireless wearable nodes to measure biochemical information, heart rate, EEG, ECG, muscle activity, joint speed and contact forces. Athletes will be able to use this information to understand how they are progressing and developing with their training.

The team is also developing small track-side sensors, for detailed monitoring of an athlete’s body movements and location, and of interactions between a team during training.

Sports scientists can currently monitor athletes’ performance through controlled experiments in a laboratory setting or, increasingly, via commercially available technologies that can be used in the ‘field’. However, the devices used for this are often large and either not suitable for use in the field, or able to measure only one aspect of an athlete’s or team’s performance. Consequently, the data collected is not realistic enough for sports scientists and coaches to understand how athletes are performing in a training or competition environment.

The new wireless ‘pervasive’ sensing technologies that the ESPRIT team is developing will extract continuous information under normal training and competition environments, giving coaches far more accurate and regular feedback about their athlete’s performance than is currently possible. The researchers will be working with the high performance sports community, with the ultimate aim of creating a competitive advantage for elite athletes.

Scientists are developing new Vision Sensor Networks that will track movements

Professor Guang-Zhong Yang from Imperial College London, who is the principal investigator and programme director of ESPRIT, says: “We expect that the ESPRIT project will make innovative leaps in biosensor design and allow us to look in really fine detail at the physiological changes that happen to an athlete during training and competition. This means that athletes and their coaches will be able to gain an unprecedented understanding of their performance and use this to develop a crucial competitive edge. The project will also give scientists new insights into how people’s bodies work, in order to help them to design devices that improve the health and wellbeing of the general population.”

For their first project, the ESPRIT team has created prototype networks of miniature video camera sensors, called Vision Sensor Networks (VSNs), which coaches can use to monitor an athlete’s movements and assess their strategies while training. The scientists are already trialling the VSNs with athletes training for Britain’s summer and winter Olympic sports.

The vision of ESPRIT is to position the UK at the forefront of pervasive sensing in elite sports and to promote its wider application in public life-long health, wellbeing and healthcare. The programme represents a unique synergy of leading UK research efforts in body sensor networks (BSN), biosensor design, and sport performance monitoring and equipment design.

Dr Scott Drawer, co-chair of ESPRIT and Head of Research and Innovation at UK Sport, adds:

“At the highest level of elite sport, we know that medals are won and lost within the tiniest margins. Our job at UK Sport is to ensure our athletes reach the start line knowing they are the best prepared and best equipped in the world.

“We are delighted to be working with leading experts on this exciting project, which we hope will not only benefit British athletes in the build up to our home Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012, but also revolutionise our approach to, and application of, science, medicine and engineering in sport for years to come.”

ESPRIT is a 5-year research project funded through EPSRC’s Programme Grants Scheme, which provides a flexible mechanism to provide funding to world-leading research groups to address significant major research challenges. The ESPRIT programme is supported by both government research institutions and leading industrial partners in sports.

- Ends -

For further information please contact:

Colin Smith
Press Officer
Imperial College London
Email: cd.smith@imperial.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0)207 594 6712
Out of hours duty press officer: +44 (0)7803 886 248

Notes to editors:

1. About UK Sport

UK Sport is the strategic lead body for high performance sport in the UK. It invests Exchequer and National Lottery funds in Britain’s best Olympic and Paralympic sports and athletes to maximise their chances of success on the world stage. UK Sport also leads the campaign to bring strategically important sporting events to our shores; works with National Governing Bodies and other partner organisations to help them build positive working relationships with International Federations and other international bodies; and currently acts as National Anti-Doping Organisation (NADO) for the UK. More at www.uksport.gov.uk

2. About the EPSRC

EPSRC is the main UK government agency for funding research and training in engineering and the physical sciences, investing more than £850 million a year in a broad range of subjects – from mathematics to materials science, and from information technology to structural engineering. www.epsrc.ac.uk

3. About Loughborough University

Loughborough is one of the country’s leading universities, with an international reputation for excellence in teaching and research, strong links with industry and unrivalled sporting ac hievement.

It was awarded the coveted Sunday Times University of the Year 2008-09 title, and is consistentl y ranked in the top twenty of UK universities in national newspaper league tables. In the 2008 National Student Survey, Loughborough was voted one of the top five universities in the UK, with 22 out of 30 of its subject areas being ranked in the top ten for overall satisfaction. It was named winner of the 2006, 2007 and 2008 Times Higher award for the UK’s Best Student Experience and winner of the 2007 award for Outstanding Support for Overseas Students. In recognition of its contribution to the sector, the University has been awarded six Queen's Anniversary Prizes – an achievement bettered by no other institution.

It is a member of the esteemed 1994 Group – a set of internationally recognised, research-intensive universities – and has a reputation for the relevance of its work. Its degree programmes are highly regarded by professional institutions and businesses, and its graduates are consistently targeted by the UK’s top recruiters.

Loughborough is also the UK’s premier university for sport. It has perhaps the best integrated sports development environment in the world and is home to some of the country’s leading coaches, sports scientists and support staff. It also has the country’s largest concentration of world-class training facilities across a wide range of sports.

4. About Queen Mary, University of London

Queen Mary, University of London is one of the UK's leading research-focused higher education institutions with some 15,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students. Amongst the largest of the colleges of the University of London, Queen Mary’s 3,000 staff deliver world class degree programmes and research across 21 academic departments and institutes, within three sectors: Science and Engineering; Humanities, Social Sciences and Laws; and the School of Medicine and Dentistry.

Ranked 11th in the UK according to the Guardian analysis of the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, Queen Mary has been described as ‘the biggest star among the research-intensive institutions’ by the Times Higher Education. Queen Mary won the Times Higher's Most Improved Student Experience for 2009, reflecting the superb academic and social experience offered to all students at the College. The College has a strong international reputation, with around 20 per cent of students coming from over 100 countries.

Queen Mary has an annual turnover of £220 million, research income worth £61 million, and generates employment and output worth £600 million to the UK economy each year. As a member of the 1994 Group of research-focused universities, Queen Mary has made a strategic commitment to the highest quality of research, but also to the best possible educational, cultural and social experience for its students.

The College is unique amongst London's universities in being able to offer a completely integrated residential campus, with a 2,000-bed award-winning Student Village on its Mile End campus. Website: www.qmul.ac.uk

5. About Imperial College London

Consistently rated amongst the world's best universities, Imperial College London is a science-based institution with a reputation for excellence in teaching and research that attracts 13,000 students and 6,000 staff of the highest international quality.

Innovative research at the College explores the interface between science, medicine, engineering and business, delivering practical solutions that improve quality of life and the environment - underpinned by a dynamic enterprise culture.

Since its foundation in 1907, Imperial's contributions to society have included the discovery of penicillin, the development of holography and the foundations of fibre optics. This commitment to the application of research for the benefit of all continues today, with current focuses including interdisciplinary collaborations to improve health in the UK and globally, tackle climate change and develop clean and sustainable sources of energy.