  Surface electromyography (sEMG) is a popular bio-signal used for controlling
prostheses and finger gesture recognition mechanisms. Myoelectric prostheses
are costly, and most commercially available sEMG acquisition systems are not
suitable for real-time gesture recognition. In this paper, a method of
acquiring sEMG signals using novel low-cost, active, dry-contact, flexible
sensors has been proposed. Since the active sEMG sensor was developed to be
used along with a bionic arm, the sensor was tested for its ability to acquire
sEMG signals that could be used for real-time classification of five selected
gestures. In a study of 4 subjects, the average classification accuracy for
real-time gesture classification using the active sEMG sensor system was 85%.
The common-mode rejection ratio of the sensor was measured to 59 dB, and thus
the sensor's performance was not substantially limited by its active circuitry.
The proposed sensors can be interfaced with a variety of amplifiers to perform
fully wearable sEMG acquisition. This satisfies the need for a low-cost sEMG
acquisition system for prostheses.
