This paper gives an overview of the different research works related to electromyographic signals (EMG) classification based on Support Vector Machines (SVM). The article summarizes the techniques used to make the classification in each reference. Furthermore, it includes the obtained accuracy, the number of signals or channels used, the way the authors made the feature vector, and the type of kernels used. Hence, this article also includes a compilation about the bands used to filter signals, the number of signals recommended, the most commonly used sampling frequencies, and certain features that can create the characteristics of the vector. This research gathers articles related to different kinds of SVM-based classification and other tools for signal processing in the field.

Zero crossings are a practical and efficient feature to approximate the frequency of a sampled series of data. Some research describes in different ways how to compute the zero crossings feature starting from its definition, and in some of them, a threshold is included as part of it. This research compiles a comprehensive list of description methods for zero crossings, both with or without threshold. In addition, an improvement of one method is proposed, mainly to save time resources. Moreover, it increases the precision when the objective is to perform some classification. This feature is often used as a vector of a matrix of features in signal classification. To test the different variations of the zero crossings methods, a classification of electromyographic signals was performed using support vector machines. The results obtained by the proposed method threw near to a 40% improvement in the classification compared to those approaches that do not consider a threshold and more than 7% compared to those with a threshold. The processing time of this work is shortened compared to others that also take into account a threshold.

Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI) are systems that allow the interaction of people and devices on the grounds of brain activity. The noninvasive and most viable way to obtain such information is by using electroencephalography (EEG). However, these signals have a low signal-to-noise ratio, as well as a low spatial resolution. This work proposes a new method built from the combination of a Blind Source Separation (BSS) to obtain estimated independent components, a 2D representation of these component signals using the Continuous Wavelet Transform (CWT), and a classification stage using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) approach. A criterion based on the spectral correlation with a Movement Related Independent Component (MRIC) is used to sort the estimated sources by BSS, thus reducing the spatial variance. The experimental results of 94.66% using a k-fold cross validation are competitive with techniques recently reported in the state-of-the-art.

The number and position of sEMG electrodes have been studied extensively due to the need to improve the accuracy of the classification they carry out of the intention of movement. Nevertheless, increasing the number of channels used for this classification often increases their processing time as well. This research work contributes with a comparison of the classification accuracy based on the different number of sEMG signal channels (one to four) placed in the right lower limb of healthy subjects. The analysis is performed using Mean Absolute Values, Zero Crossings, Waveform Length, and Slope Sign Changes; these characteristics comprise the feature vector. The algorithm used for the classification is the Support Vector Machine after applying a Principal Component Analysis to the features. The results show that it is possible to reach more than 90% of classification accuracy by using 4 or 3 channels. Moreover, the difference obtained with 500 and 1000 samples, with 2, 3 and 4 channels, is not higher than 5%, which means that increasing the number of channels does not guarantee 100% precision in the classification.

Brushed (B) and Brushless (BL) DC motors constitute the cornerstone of mechatronic systems regardless their sizes (including miniaturized), in which both position and speed control tasks require the application of sophisticated algorithms. This manuscript addresses the initial step using time series analysis to forecast Back EMF values, thereby enabling the elaboration of real-time adaptive fine-tuning strategies for PID controllers in such a control system design problem. An Auto-Regressive Moving Average (ARMA) model is developed to estimate the DC motor parameter, which evolves in time due to the system’s imperfection (i.e., unpredictable duty cycle) and influences the closed-loop performance. The methodology is executed offline; thus, it highlights the applicability of collected BDC motor measurements in time series analysis. The proposed method updates the PID controller gains based on the Simulink ™ controller tuning toolbox. The contribution of this approach is shown in a comparative study that indicates an opportunity to use time series analysis to forecast DC motor parameters, to re-tune PID controller gains, and to obtain similar performance under the same perturbation conditions. The research demonstrates the practical applicability of the proposed method for fine-tuning/re-tuning controllers in real-time. The results show the inclusion of the time series analysis to recalculate controller gains as an alternative for adaptive control.

The best way to represent EMG signals for classification is a topic that has been widely studied due to the need to improve precision when identifying the type of movement being performed. However, by increasing the number of features when forming a matrix that represents the signals, the processing time increases since it not only involves calculating the features that are extracted from the signal but also the time that the classifier takes to answer. The central purpose of this research is to develop and validate a methodology that uses the Fisher Score to select a set of features in the classification of sEMG signals. This selected set is descriptive enough to achieve high levels of accuracy in detecting EMG signal patterns across multiple subjects. The analysis shows that using a variant of MAV, SSC, WAMP, RMS, and the maximum value together with the Shannon entropy and zero crossings of the Wavelet transform has an accuracy greater than 99%. Finally, a group of features is proposed to classify EMG signals that yield an accuracy greater than 98% and do not require more than 15 ms of processing time.