MAVEHA, Simon's MSc project

Описание: The time during pregnancy and the first weeks and months after birth are critical for sensorimotor development, and a distinct change in fetal or neonatal movements can be an indicator of neurological or motor-system compromise. As is commonly known, fetuses and neonates move a lot spontaneously. The quantity and quality of these movements evolve significantly during early development, and clear deviations in this trajectory are thought to be an indicator of adverse neurodevelopment.

In current clinical practice, fetal or neonatal movements are not systematically quantified, leading to under-diagnosis of conditions for which reduced or abnormal movements are the key characteristic. Fetal movements have been shown to be abnormal in the case of severe brain abnormalities (e.g., anencephaly) but there are also indications that neurological conditions such as autism and cerebral palsy (CP) result in abnormal movement signatures in very early life.

This project addresses the clear need for an objective and automated means to quantitatively assess fetal and neonatal movement patterns, to facilitate earlier diagnosis and more effective treatments of life-changing conditions affecting babies and children.

Simon did a MSc final year project on a focused aspect of the project: How to generate 3D poses from 2D videos?