====== Motivation ====== Smartphones are increasingly more available and used by an ever increasing number of people due to the capabilities they possess, like a high processing power and storage capacity, connectivity solutions like Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, capacitive screens that allow for a user to interact with these devices by pressing on the screens themselves and others. These lead to a general increase in the Quality of Life (QOL) of the users. One of the ways that QOL can be improved is through the use of applications focused on the healthcare and wellbeing, thus turning smartphones, effectively, into personal health systems that are easily portable. These can be especially useful for the treatment of the motor symptoms of people suffering from Parkinson’s Disease (PD), a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system which causes physical impairment, being the most evident motor related symptoms shaking, rigidity, slowness of movement and difficulty with walking and an abnormal postural balance. These symptoms are frequently the cause of falls, which may lead to fractures or even death, thus increasing the costs in a national health service. A way to reduce gait variability on People with Parkinson’s (PWP) is through the use of Rhythmic Auditory Stimuli (RAS), as evidenced by several studies that have been performed and, due to the fact that the use of a smartphone and a headset connected to it isn’t awkward for the user and for the people surrounding him, it’s possible to implement a relatively hidden and effective system that deals with this problem. Recently, the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research has issued several kinds of challenges targeted towards scientists and software developers, being the most recent one a chal- lenge in which the purpose is to measure the symptoms associated with PD with a smartphone. This challenge in particular got the attention of worldwide media and raised awareness about PD. ====== Context ====== This dissertation will be developed in Fraunhofer Assistive Information and Communication Solutions (AICOS), as a project related to "REMPARK", an European wide project supported through the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), whose purpose is to develop a personal health system featuring closed loop detection, with response and treatment capabilities, for the improved management of PWP. The focus of this dissertation will be to exploit RAS in order to enhance or correct the gait of PWP. This will be done through the processing and analysis of the data incoming from the motion sensors embedded in Android based smartphones, which will be used to detect what kind of gait dysfunction that the patient is suffering in real-time and then, based on what kind of symptom and other kinds of features, sounds or music will be playing through a headset connected to a smartphone, which will be adapted to the specific needs of the user depending on the situation. ====== Objectives ====== The main goals for this topic are: * Develop a system able to detect movement measures and symptoms in real time based on the information of the smartphone’s sensors. * Investigate the kinds of rhythmic auditory stimuli most apt for Parkinson’s disease patients, according to the symptom they’re experiencing and if it’s desirable to either maintain or enhance their pace. * Investigate the feasibility of using music (that is, rhythm and melody and/or harmony) as an auditory stimuli for Parkinson’s disease patients. * Develop algorithms to adapt the characteristics of sounds (including the rhythm and melody and/or harmony) to the specific needs of each user in each situation. * Develop the system as an Android application.