'Beyond Motion' seminar by Wenbo Zhang

Abstract

Wearable systems are increasingly capable of recognising how people move, yet they still have limited access to the hidden physical states that shape movement, such as muscle activation, loading, force, asymmetry, and fatigue. This gap limits their ability to provide feedback that is timely, interpretable, and useful in everyday settings.

In this talk, I will present a line of research that progresses from multimodal movement sensing and biomechanical inference to structured body-state representation and closed-loop interaction. Drawing on work using IMU, EMG, plantar pressure, and PPG, I will discuss how wearable sensing can recover not only observable motion, but also hidden activation- and force-related states. I will then show how these states can be translated into low-burden feedback and new forms of bodily interaction, with examples spanning exercise, rehabilitation, silent input, and wearable agents.

More broadly, I will outline a vision for body-state-aware wearable intelligence: systems that move beyond passive monitoring to understand the body, reason about changes over time, and provide personalised, actionable support in real-world contexts.

Short Bio

Wenbo Zhang is a PhD candidate at South China University of Technology and currently a visiting researcher at University College London, working with Professor Jagmohan Chauhan. His research lies at the intersection of wearable sensing, human movement understanding, and human-computer interaction. He develops multimodal wearable systems that combine signals such as IMU, EMG, pressure, and PPG to infer hidden physical states of the body, including muscle activation, loading, asymmetry, and force, and to translate these states into real-time feedback and interaction. His broader research goal is to build wearable systems that move beyond passive motion monitoring toward understanding the body and providing personalised, actionable support in exercise, rehabilitation, and everyday settings.