Localization of Wearable Ultra Wideband Antennas for Motion Capture Applications

This paper presents a study of human body localisation using Ultra Wideband (UWB) technology. Various base station configurations, time of arrival and first peak detection algorithms are used to estimate the position of body-worn antennas. Localisation error as small as 1-2 cm has been achieved using 8 base stations which is comparable to the measurement accuracy obtained by complex optical motion capture system to determine the absolute displacement error. The localisation error obtained is better by a third in comparison to common commercial system based on UWB technology. The results demonstrate that Cuboid-shape configuration with 4 base stations gives slightly low average percentage error (2 to 3%) in comparison to Y-shape (4%). However, the Y-shape configuration is more compact and provides setting up simplicity, which makes it convenient for various applications ranging from healthcare monitoring to entertainment technologies either laboratory based or in-home.