Secure and Efficient sEMG Signal Transmission Using Human Body Communication for Upper Limb Prostheses

In recent years, surface electromyography (sEMG) signals have emerged as a valuable tool for assisting individuals with physical disabilities. Traditional methods for transmitting sEMG signals often rely on radio frequency (RF) links, which are energy-intensive and lack robust security. This paper presents a new design for a Human Body Communication (HBC) transceiver tailored for sEMG sensors. The proposed HBC transceiver employs an end-to-end autoencoder approach, offering enhanced energy efficiency and security. The architecture supports the required data rates for sEMG applications and is optimized for low power consumption, making it suitable for wearable devices. The results show that the HBC transceiver design demonstrates a peak data rate of 62.5 Kbps and a block error rate of approximately <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$10^{-2}$</tex> at −5.17 dB of Ec/N0 when operating at a clock speed of 2 MHz. Moreover, the power consumption results indicate that the HBC transceiver consumes 287 <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$\mu \mathrm{W}$</tex> resulting in an energy efficiency of 4.5 nJ/bit,