Dezert-Smarandache theory-based fusion for human activity recognition in body sensor networks

Multi-sensor fusion strategies have been widely applied in Human Activity Recognition (HAR) in Body Sensor Networks (BSNs). However, the sensory data collected by BSNs systems are often uncertain or even incomplete. Thus, designing a robust and intelligent sensor fusion strategy is necessary for high-quality activity recognition. In this paper, Dezert-Smarandache Theory (DSmT) is used to develop a novel sensor fusion strategy for HAR in BSNs, which can effectively improve the accuracy of recognition. Specifically, in the training stage, the Kernel Density Estimation (KDE) based models are first built and then precisely selected for each specific activity according to the proposed discriminative functions. After that, a structure of Basic Belief Assignment (BBA) can be constructed, using the relationship between the test data of unknown class and the selected KDE models of all considered types of activities. In order to deal with the conflict between the obtained BBAs, Proportional Conflict Redistribution-6 (PCR6) is applied to fuse the acquired BBAs. Moreover, the missing data of the involved sensors are addressed as ignorance in the framework of the DSmT without manual interpolation or intervention. Experimental studies on two real-world activity recognition datasets (The OPPORTUNITY dataset; Daily and Sports Activity Dataset (DSAD)) were conducted, and the results showed the superiority of our proposed method over some state-of-the-art approaches proposed in the literature.