[LUM#17] The sky's the limit
Startup Semaxone promises to monitor the operational status of pilots using a sensor capable of measuring their brain activity in real time. A high-flying project to improve safety and performance in civil and military aviation.
Guilhem Belda is taking off1*, a computer engineer with a passion for aeronautics. His favorite subject? Ergonomics—or how to ensure that a “complex system,” such as an airplane in flight, adapts in real time to the human piloting it. The young engineer has envisioned a technology that is propelling him into the world of entrepreneurship: “a sensor and algorithms capable of analyzing pilots’ voices and brain activity to monitor changes in their operational and physiological states in real time.”
The wide range of skills required made it clear to Guilhem Belda that this flight wouldn’t be possible without a strong team. For voice analysis, he turned to the computer science lab in Avignon. All that remained was to find a third co-pilot, and the Mines d’Alès business incubator acted as his control tower, directing him toEuroMov Digital Health in Motion, where Stéphane Perrey works—a neurophysiologist specializing in measuring brain oxygenation and its impact on our cognitive performance.
Pilot Study
For the past 10 years, Stéphane Perrey has been using an optical method called near-infrared spectroscopy, or NIRS. “This process quantifies the oxygenated and deoxygenated portions of hemoglobin in brain tissue using LEDs that emit infrared light at two specific wavelengths. It’s a bit like when you measure your oxygen saturation with a finger clip,” he explains. Semaxone’s flight plan is ambitious: to measure, during flight, the impact of altitude and successive accelerations on pilots’ brain oxygenation and, consequently, on their decision-making abilities in stressful situations.
“This is highly innovative work that is of great interest to the aviation sector,” notes Guilhem Belda. To conduct this study, the partners designed a device resembling a headlamp and successfully equipped the pilots of the French aerobatics team—including the world champion—with it. “ During these flights, they experience a succession of gravitational forces of ±10 G, ” explains Stéphane Perrey, “extreme conditions that affect brain function and can pose a risk of syncope.” This is a risk that Semaxone technology can prevent by providing real-time alerts on the pilot’s neurophysiological status.
Return Flight
Alerting is certainly important, but who should be alerted and how? Should it be connected to the cockpit and transmit the information directly to the pilot, with the risk of overwhelming him? Should it go through a third party? “This is an industry-wide issue that hasn’t yet been resolved and involves different certifications. We need to figure out what we want to do with it and how soon,” the entrepreneur says. In the short term , the sensor could be used as a flight debriefing tool “for training purposes, so that pilots can practice better managing these situations. We’re talking about neurofeedback,” explains Stéphane Perrey.
In the longer term, Guilhem Belda is working with certain aircraft manufacturers to design smart aircraft capable of adapting to the pilot . “We’re thinking of ergonomic adjustments that would highlight certain information or limit the impact of acceleration.” Anything is possible—the sky’s the limit!
Check out the Semaxone drivers in action in this video showcasing the projects of the EuroMov Digital Health in Motion research unit:
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- EuroMov DHM (UM, IMT Mines Ales) ↩︎