Bulletin

Issue: June 2005

News

New device tracks sports performance

A La Trobe University electronics student has developed a device that can calculate how far a footballer ran during a match, how fast he moved, and where he was at any given moment.

A 'real time' tracking system, it also has uses in other sports and areas including navigation.

Darren Hayes, a fourth year student in La Trobe's School of Electronic Engineering, has won several prizes for his device.

He came second in the Institution of Electrical Engineers National Student Prize Competition, having previously won the Victorian prize with his 'Position Location Sensor'.

Then the device took another prize, from the magazine EDN, in its Innovation Award for the Best Student Project for 2004. Another La Trobe student, Rebecca Hendry, was shortlisted for the award for her invention of 'Resusci Baby' - a manikin that uses ultrasound and infrared technology to help train doctors and nurses in cardiopulmonary resuscitation techniques. (See October 2004 La Trobe Bulletin.)

Mr Hayes also won the Hooper Memorial Presentation for La Trobe final year Electronic Engineering students.

He says the device uses a tiny transmitter, carried by the sportsperson or other user, which sends signals to three receivers in different locations. These are forwarded to a computer which determines by 'triangulation' the position of the sportsperson at any given moment, accurate to within 10mm.

The delay between transmission and reception also enables other calculations. For example, worn by a footballer, it can assess how fast and far he ran. Mr Hayes, whose project was supervised by associate lecturer, Mr Darrell Elton, now works as an electronic development engineer with Aviation Data Systems on La Trobe's Research and Development Park, on the Bundoora campus.