Ralph Lauren Smart Shirt Will Measure Heart Rate And Calories Burned
August 28, 2015
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
NEW YORK – Famed fashion designer Ralph Lauren has launched a new shirt that combines fashion and technology that will allow wearers to measure their heart rates and calories burned while wearing it.
The new PoloTech Smartshirt, available for purchase beginning Aug, 27, features sensory receivers woven into the fabric that provides real time data, such as heart rate, stress levels, breathing levels, energy output and more, to allow wearers to maximize their workouts. Additionally, the shirt will record the number of calories burned and the number of steps taken during a workout.
“This is a bridge between technology, fitness and style that approaches wellness and well-being in comprehensive and complementary ways. It will touch many parts of your life,” David Lauren, executive vice president of global advertising, marketing and corporate communications, said in a statement.
The smartshirt was developed in partnership with proprietary technology from Canadian-based OMSignal, whose team includes experts in neuroscience, sports medicine and engineering. Data is collected in a “black box” placed inside a specially designed pocket below the iconic Polo logo and can then stream the feed to a mobile device using an Apple operating system. The shirt’s “black box” that collects and processes the information uses five connectors and contains a 3D accelerometer that captures intensity of movement based on three g-force measurements, the company said. The black box can be removed so owners can launder the shirt.
The shirt underwent a live test during the 2014 U.S. Open tennis tournament, where Ralph Lauren is the official outfitter.
“The top-ranked college player making his debut at the premier tennis event as well as an elite squad of official ball persons were measured for relative fitness, measuring heart rate, recovery, time spent in aerobic and anaerobic zones, calories and distance,” the company said.
The PoloTech Smartshirt retails for $295 and is available at RalphLauren.com, the company’s flagship store in New York City and at its U.S. Open store on the grounds of the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
While the PoloTech Smartshirt is designed to enhance workout experiences, Apple’s technology has been on the cutting edge of data gathering to develop patient information. In April, Apple unveiled ResearchKit, a software framework designed for medical and health research that helps doctors, scientists and other researchers gather data more frequently and more accurately from participants using mobile devices. The app was met with enthusiasm as more than 60,000 iPhone users signed up with the app. The first research apps developed using ResearchKit study asthma, breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and Parkinson’s disease. According to Apple, the open source framework allows any medical researcher to take advantage of the initial modules in ResearchKit to study health and wellness and better understand disease. Developers can also build new modules based on the open source code and contribute them to ResearchKit. The initial customizable modules address the most common elements found in research studies—participant consent, surveys and active tasks.
ResearchKit will be linked to Apple’s HealthKit, which was unveiled with iOS 8. HealthKit allows fitness and health apps to work together on the iPhone, and 900 apps have already been created using the technology.