The utilitarian chair. Its simple structure and function haven’t changed in millennia. But researchers at Missouri University of Science and Technology have made the humble chair a portal into not only a person’s movements, but also their mental state.
Dr. Debraj De, a postdoctoral fellow at Missouri S&T, and Dr. Sajal K. Das, the Daniel St. Clair Endowed Chair and department chair of computer science at Missouri S&T, have developed a chair that could help detect the daily behavior and mental health of elderly people at home or in assisted-living facilities — specifically rehabilitation patients and elderly people susceptible to levels of dementia.
