Thermal imaging can be used for human detection, due to a high contrast of the elevated human body temperature compared to the temperatures of a typical indoor environment. Thermal imaging with low resolution can be used for detecting humans reliably within a typical room area. The advantages of low resolution thermal imaging compared to conventional video monitoring using lights visible to human eyes include not only the good human-background contrast, but also non-intrusion into privacy. When the resolution of thermal imaging is low such that a few pixels are used to represent a person, the thermal image of the person appears as a blob without fine features about the person. Thus, the thermal image cannot be used to specifically identify the individual. Such technology can be used for the monitoring of elders and patients to provide care in response to certain situations, such as fall, without privacy intrusion.
For example, U.S. Pat. App. Pub. No. 2015/0377711, entitled “Apparatus and Method for Electromagnetic Radiation Sensing”, discloses an apparatus for thermal imaging based on infrared (IR) radiation. Such an apparatus can be used for human detection, fire detection, gas detection, temperature measurements, environmental monitoring, energy saving, behavior analysis, surveillance, information gathering and for human-machine interfaces. Such an apparatus and/or other similar apparatuses can be used in embodiments of inventions disclosed in the present application. The entire disclosure of U.S. Pat. App. Pub. No. 2015/0377711 is hereby incorporated herein by reference.