The vigilance of the driver is important for railway safety, despite not being included in the safety management system (SMS) for high-speed train safety. In this paper, a novel fatigue detection system for high-speed train safety based on monitoring train driver vigilance using a wireless wearable electroencephalograph (EEG) is presented. This system is designed to detect whether the driver is drowsiness. The proposed system consists of three main parts: (1) a wireless wearable EEG collection; (2) train driver vigilance detection; and (3) early warning device for train driver. In the first part, an 8-channel wireless wearable brain-computer interface (BCI) device acquires the locomotive driver’s brain EEG signal comfortably under high-speed train-driving conditions. The recorded data are transmitted to a personal computer (PC) via Bluetooth. In the second step, a support vector machine (SVM) classification algorithm is implemented to determine the vigilance level using the Fast Fourier transform (FFT) to extract the EEG power spectrum density (PSD). In addition, an early warning device begins to work if fatigue is detected. The simulation and test results demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed fatigue detection system for high-speed train safety.

In this paper, we review, compare, and analyze previous studies on vibration energy harvesting and related technologies. First, the paper introduces the basic aspects of vibration energy acquisition in the railway environment, including vibration frequency, train speed, energy flow in the train, and vibration energy harvesting potential. Generally, the methods for scavenging vibration energy caused by passing trains can be divided into four categories: electromagnetic harvesters, piezoelectric harvesters, triboelectric harvesters, and hydraulic harvesters. The structure, output performance, merits, and disadvantages of different energy harvesting strategies are summarized and compared. The application of vibration energy harvesters is explained as supplying power to monitoring sensors on the line side and the vehicle side. Finally, the paper addresses the challenges and difficulties that have not been completely resolved in the current research literature, including system stability, durability, and economy. Some recommendations to fill these research gaps are put forward for further investigation.