The main reason the coronavirus has shut down society isn’t that it’s deadly; it’s that it’s invisible. If you could see the damn particles — as a neon-yellow cloud on someone’s breath, or a neon-yellow patch on a doorknob — you could avoid it, and the disease wouldn’t spread.

吨他的冠状病毒已关闭社会主要的原因不在于它是致命的; 那是看不见的。 如果您可以看到该死的颗粒(如某人的呼吸上的霓虹灯黄色的云朵或门把手上的霓虹灯黄色的斑点)，则可以避免，并且这种疾病不会扩散。

Fitbit is in the business of making the invisible visible. From the vibration patterns of your footsteps, they reveal how active you are. From your arm-movement patterns, they determine what exercise you’re performing. From your heart rate and tossing-and-turning frequency, they can graph your sleep stages.

Fitbit致力于使看不见的东西可见。 从脚步的振动模式可以看出您有多活跃。 通过您的手臂运动模式，他们可以确定您正在执行的运动。 从您的心率和起伏频率，他们可以绘制您的睡眠阶段。

The company’s latest ambition is to expand that detection principle to your overall health. If a smartwatch could learn the patterns of an early Covid-19 infection, for example, it could save your life and thousands of others. Fitbit’s new smartwatch, the Fitbit Sense (announced today and out next month for $329) is the first step.

在C 0 mpany的最新目标是扩大这一检测原理，以您的整体健康。 例如，如果智能手表可以学习早期Covid-19感染的模式，则可以挽救您的生命以及成千上万的生命。 Fitbit的新款智能手表Fitbit Sense(今天和下个月宣布，售价329美元)是第一步。

Like the company’s previous efforts, it’s not a do-everything cellular wonder toy like the Apple Watch. It doesn’t make phone calls or unlock your Mac. Its app store has a few hundred apps, not tens of thousands.

像该公司以前的努力一样，它不是像Apple Watch那样的万能手机奇迹玩具。 它不会拨打电话或解锁Mac。 它的应用程序商店中有几百个应用程序，而不是数万个。

Instead, it’s primarily dedicated to health and fitness. The Sense is bristling with sensors. They cover one third of its entire surface and include:

相反，它主要致力于健康和健身。 Sense充满传感器。 它们覆盖了整个表面的三分之一，包括：

Skin thermometer. The entire stainless-steel back, set against your wrist, is part of the new skin-temperature system.

皮肤温度计。 整个不锈钢后背靠在手腕上，是新的皮肤温度系统的一部分。

Electrodermal activity (EDA) sensor. This sensor measures your physical stress level.

皮肤电活动(EDA)传感器 。 该传感器测量您的身体压力水平。

When you want an EDA measurement, you rest your palm on the watch’s face. Tiny electrodes pass a faint current through your fingers, measuring their impedance.

当您需要进行EDA测量时，您可以将手掌放在手表的脸上。 微小的电极使微弱的电流通过手指，从而测量其阻抗。

“As you get stressed out, or upset, or excited, you get these little microsweats,” says Shelten Yuen, Fitbit’s head of research. “Well, sweat is conductive. The more sweat, the more salty conductive stuff you have on your skin, the easier it conducts, and the lower the impedance.”

Fitbit的研究主管谢尔滕·袁(Shelten Yuen)表示：“当您感到压力，烦恼或兴奋时，就会出现这些小汗毛。” 嗯，汗水是导电的。 汗水越多，皮肤上的导电物质越咸，导电越容易，并且阻抗越低。”

For now, the phone app uses this data primarily during de-stressing activities, like meditation, relaxation breathing, or mindfulness. “We give you feedback on how that session is going,” says Larry Yang, vice president of product.

目前，电话应用程序主要在减压活动中使用此数据，例如冥想，放松呼吸或正念。 产品副总裁Larry Yang说：“我们会为您提供有关该会议进行情况的反馈。”

Electrocardiogram (ECG). This time, the electrodes on the bezel team up with the plate against your wrist to complete a circuit through your body. The goal is to sense the voltage around your heart, and thereby display, on the phone app, a full-blown ECG graph. Doctors use ECG readouts to detect heart conditions like abnormal rhythms, heart attack, and blocked arteries.

心电图(ECG)。 这次，表圈上的电极与板抵靠您的手腕并排在一起，从而完成了一条贯穿您身体的电路。 目的是感应心脏周围的电压，从而在手机应用程序上显示完整的ECG图。 医生使用ECG读数来检测心脏状况，例如节律异常，心脏病发作和动脉阻塞。

PPG heart-rate sensors. Most high-end fitness watches use photoplethysmography to detect your blood flow: rapidly flashing LEDs against your skin, coupled with optical sensors that measure the reflected light.

PPG心率传感器。 大多数高端健身手表使用光电容积描记法来检测您的血流：快速闪烁的LED贴着您的皮肤，再加上可测量反射光的光学传感器。

The Sense’s new PPG system, which Fitbit calls PurePulse 2.0, incorporates six LEDs instead of one, as in previous Fitbits, which dramatically enhances workout accuracy. That way, says Yang, “If the watch is a little off-center, like when you’re running, and it’s not getting a clean signal, we can error-correct” to get a more accurate reading. (To save battery power, the extra LEDs light up only when you’re active or exercising.)

Fitbit将Sense的新PPG系统称为PurePulse 2.0，该系统包含六个 LED取代了以前的Fitbits中的LED，大大提高了锻炼的准确性。 杨说，“这样，如果手表偏心一点，例如当您在跑步时，并且没有收到清晰的信号，我们就可以进行错误校正”以获取更准确的读数。 (为节省电池电量，仅当您运动或锻炼时，额外的LED才会点亮。)

The heart sensor also measures the changes in your heart rate — pulse variability — which plays a key part in tracking your stages of sleep, your cardio zones, your daily active minutes, and your breathing rate.

心脏传感器还可以测量变化 在您的心率(脉搏变异性)中，这在跟踪您的睡眠阶段，心脏区域，每日活动时间和呼吸速率中起着关键作用。

SPO2 sensor. Those LEDs flash green to measure your pulse. But by flashing infrared light instead, they can detect your relative SPO2 (saturation of peripheral oxygen), which is how much oxygen your red blood cells are carrying. Breathing problems like sleep apnea and COPD can produce spikes in your oxygen saturation levels.

SPO2传感器。 这些LED闪烁绿色以测量您的脉搏。 但是，通过闪烁红外光，它们可以检测到您的相对SPO2(外围氧气的饱和度)，也就是您的红血球携带的氧气量。 呼吸暂停和COPD等呼吸问题可能会导致您的血氧饱和度升高。

Accelerometer. Here’s the most ancient element, the great-grandchild of the very first Fitbit pedometer: It’s a three-axis motion sensor, which assists with step counting, exercise tracking, and sleep measurements.

加速度计。 这是最古老的元素，也是第一款Fitbit计步器的曾孙：这是一个三轴运动传感器，可帮助进行步数计数，运动跟踪和睡眠测量。

Gyroscope. This six-axis sensor measures the angular velocity of your wrist. Today, Fitbit uses it only to track strokes and laps when you’re swimming.

陀螺仪 该六轴传感器可测量手腕的角速度。 如今，Fitbit仅在游泳时使用它来跟踪冲程和圈数。

Barometric altimeter. Why on earth would a watch need an altimeter? To track how many flights of stairs you take each day, of course.

气压高度计。 为什么地球上的手表需要高度计？ 当然，要跟踪您每天要走多少个楼梯。

Unless you’re a quantified-self nerd, your first reaction to all of this may be: Who cares? (“Morning, honey! My SPO2 was 96% last night!”)

除非您是一个量化自我的书呆子，否则您对所有这些的第一React可能是：谁在乎？ (“早上，亲爱的！我的SPO2昨晚是96％！”)

The data’s value skyrockets, though, when it comes to disease detection — a new realm for wearables. The individual sensors on the Sense watch are not as accurate as hospital gear, and Fitbit is cautious not to suggest otherwise. “We want to avoid sending lots and lots of people into health care facilities unnecessarily,” Jonah Becker, vice president of design, says. But drawing on the petabytes of real-world data it’s collected from previous devices can help Fitbit make some interesting connections.

但是，在疾病检测方面，数据的价值突飞猛进-可穿戴设备的新领域。 Sense手表上的各个传感器不如医院装备精确，Fitbit谨慎选择不要这样做。 “我们希望避免不必要地将很多人送入医疗机构，”设计副总裁乔纳·贝克尔(Jonah Becker)说。 但是，利用从以前的设备中收集的PB级真实世界数据，可以帮助Fitbit建立一些有趣的连接。

In May, Fitbit opened an opt-in Covid study of 100,000 Fitbit wearers. By the end of the study, about 1,000 of them had tested positive for Covid-19.

今年5月，Fitbit对100,000名Fitbit佩戴者进行了参与的Covid研究 。 到研究结束时，其中约有1,000名Covid-19测试阳性。

Suddenly, the company’s researchers had a remarkable opportunity: They could look backward through those people’s data to see if, buried in the biometric data, there were any early signs that indicated a Covid infection.

突然，公司的研究人员有了一个难得的机会：他们可以向后看 通过这些人的数据，看看是否存在埋在生物特征识别数据中的任何早期迹象表明存在Covid感染。

The answer was yes.

答案是肯定的 。

According to the Fitbit study, a Covid infection drives your breathing rate up, your resting heart rate up, and your pulse variability down. About half the time, these metrics change a day or two before you feel any symptoms. (Fitbit has submitted the study to a medical journal — the company declined to say which — but you can read it ahead of time.)

根据Fitbit的研究，Covid感染可提高您的呼吸频率，您的静息心率以及脉搏变异性。 大约有一半的时间，这些指标会在您出现任何症状之前改变一两天。 (Fitbit已将研究报告提交给医学杂志，该公司拒绝透露该研究报告，但您可以提前阅读 。)

Fitbit’s smartwatches can already measure those telltale signs, and the Sense’s new skin thermometer can detect if you have a fever, too. All the company has to do now is develop the software to alert you about a possible infection, so that you can get a proper test and start isolating. Such a software update should, in principle, work on Fitbit’s existing Versa smartwatches, too.

Fitbit的智能手表已经可以测量这些迹象，而Sense的新型皮肤温度计也可以检测出您是否发烧。 公司现在要做的就是开发该软件，以警告您可能的感染，以便您进行适当的测试并开始隔离。 原则上，这样的软件更新也应该适用于Fitbit现有的Versa智能手表。

The nasal-swab Covid-19 tests people get today “are not perfect,” says Becker. “The sensitivity is not fantastic. By the time you get tested, you are likely to have symptoms already. So if there are ways that we can use our biometrics to help people identify an infection sooner, there’s a lot of value in that.” Remember: The Fitbit could theoretically alert you a day or two before you start feeling sick. At that point, you could self-isolate immediately rather than, say, running your errands and possibly exposing other people to the virus.

贝克尔说，今天人们获得的鼻拭子Covid-19测试“并不完美”。 “敏感性并不出色。 在您接受测试时，您可能已经出现了症状。 因此，如果有某种方法可以使用我们的生物识别技术来帮助人们更快地识别出感染，那将具有很大的价值。” 切记：理论上，Fitbit可能会在一两天内提醒您开始不适。 到那时，您可以立即自我隔离，而不是奔跑，使其他人容易感染该病毒。

The company says that it’s working on this feature, but has no release date in mind; developing machine-learning algorithms that can reliably determine patterns and make predictions, based on massive streams of sensor data from thousands of people, takes time to perfect. Yuen notes, for example, that training the Fitbit’s software to pick up subtle changes in your heart rate took years, but that it can now find telltale heart-rate variations that humans might miss. “I’ll be staring at this data and sometimes I just can’t see it,” he says. “But machine learning can find these very small heart-rate signals that we can’t even see with our own eyes.”

该公司表示正在使用此功能，但没有考虑发布日期。 基于数千人的大量传感器数据流，开发能够可靠地确定模式并做出预测的机器学习算法，需要花费大量时间来完善。 例如，Yuen指出，训练Fitbit的软件以了解您的心率的细微变化需要花费数年的时间，但现在它可以发现人类可能会遗忘的明显心率变化。 他说：“我将盯着这些数据，有时我只是看不到它。” “但是机器学习可以找到我们什至无法用肉眼看到的很小的心率信号。”

The fact that the company is working on Covid tracking — that its watches already have all the biological measurements they need — leads to another question: What other invisible conditions could these sensors detect early, when there’s still time to intervene?

公司正在运作的事实 在Covid追踪中-手表已经具备了所需的所有生物测量结果-导致另一个问题：还有什么 在还有时间干预的时候，这些传感器是否可以及早发现隐形条件？

“I feel like the question might be, what couldn’t it do?” says Yuen. “The treasure trove of this data — it’s not clear yet what the limits are.”

“我觉得问题可能是，什么不能 是吗？” 袁说。 “这些数据的宝库-尚不清楚极限是什么。”

For now, the Sense’s attempts to alert you of impending medical issues are limited. You can opt to get notifications if your heart rate goes over or under specified thresholds, which could indicate bradycardia (heart beating too slowly) or tachycardia (too fast), both of which require medical intervention. A software update will soon offer a similar feature for SPO2 readings.

目前，Sense提醒您注意即将发生的医疗问题的尝试是有限的。 如果您的心率超过或低于指定的阈值，您可能会选择接收通知，这可能表示心动过缓(心脏跳动过慢)或心动过速(过快)，这两种情况都需要医疗干预。 软件更新很快将为SPO2读数提供类似的功能。

And the Sense, like the Apple Watch before it, can already detect heart-rhythm irregularities that suggest atrial fibrillation. That’s the world’s most common heart-rhythm abnormality, affecting over 5 million Americans.

Sense就像之前的Apple Watch一样，已经可以检测到提​​示心律不齐的心房颤动。 这是世界上最常见的心律异常，影响了超过500万美国人。

When you have a-fib, the top chambers of the heart (the atria) occasionally quiver instead of pumping. Your blood doesn’t move, and it clots. In 35% of a-fib patients, these clots eventually break off and float to the brain, causing a stroke. The clots can also cause heart attack, kidney disease, and dementia. Clearly, early warning that you have a-fib might be very helpful.

当您有房颤时，心脏的上腔(心房)偶尔会颤动，而不是抽动。 你的血液不动，凝结。 在3％的房颤患者中，这些血块最终会脱落并漂浮到大脑中，从而引起中风。 血块也会引起心脏病，肾脏疾病和痴呆症。 显然，早期警告您有异动症可能会很有帮助。

“The treasure trove of this data — it’s not clear yet what the limits are.”

“这些数据的宝库-尚不清楚极限是什么。”

Doctors can test you for atrial fibrillation in their offices — but if you’re not having an a-fib attack at the time of the test, they can’t catch it. That’s why having a heart monitor on your wrist all the time is a big deal, especially if you’re at risk of a-fib or have some history of it.

医生可以在您的办公室对您进行房颤测试-但是如果您在测试时没有房颤发作，他们将无法捕获。 这就是为什么始终要在手腕上佩戴心脏监护仪的原因，特别是如果您有房颤的风险或有一定病史的原因。

The Sense’s ECG test involves laying your fingers on the bezel for 30 seconds. If the watch discovers suspicious atrial activity, it advises you to get checked out by a doctor. “We also point you to help articles on how to interpret the data, and what next steps you should take,” says Yang.

Sense的ECG测试包括将手指放在边框上30秒钟。 如果手表发现可疑的心房活动，建议您去看医生。 Yang表示：“我们还为您提供有关如何解释数据以及应采取的下一步措施的帮助文章。”

High blood pressure detection should one day be possible, too. Researchers have found a correlation between pulse arrival time — how fast the blood moves in your cardiovascular system — and hypertension.

高血压检测也应该有一天。 研究人员发现，脉冲到达时间(血液在心血管系统中的移动速度)与高血压之间存在相关性。

To measure pulse arrival time, you’d need two sensors: an ECG to know when the heart is pumping, and PPG to detect each pulse’s arrival in your extremities. The Sense watch has both. “We’ve been looking into it,” says Yuen.

要测量脉冲到达时间，您需要两个传感器：一个ECG(用于知道心脏何时抽动)和PPG(用于检测每个脉冲在您的四肢中的到达)。 Sense手表兼具两者。 “我们一直在研究它，” Yuen说。

And what about Type 2 diabetes? It’s a largely preventable disease that affects about 32 million Americans, can lead to heart disease, blindness, and kidney disease. One of its symptoms is decreased circulation in your feet — and in your hands, where a smartwatch might notice the change.

那2型糖尿病呢？ 它是一种可预防的疾病，影响了大约3200万美国人 ，可能导致心脏病，失明和肾脏疾病。 其症状之一是脚部和手部的血液循环减少，而智能手表可能会注意到这种变化。

There’s a microphone on these watches, too. At the moment, Fitbit’s not using it for biometric purposes — but why not? It could hear you coughing. It could hear you snoring. (Fitbit is, in fact, testing a snore-detection feature.)

这些手表上也有麦克风。 目前，Fitbit并未将其用于生物识别目的-但是为什么不呢？ 它可以听到你咳嗽的声音。 它可以听到你打呼.。 (实际上，Fitbit正在测试打sn检测功能 。)

The Apple Watch lets you know when the sound levels around you have gone over 90 decibels for three minutes. But what about chronic noise levels?

Apple Watch会在三分钟内告知您周围的声音何时超过90分贝。 但是慢性噪音水平呢？

“Studies show that high levels of ambient noise can lead to high levels of stress, which can affect things like blood pressure,” Yuen says. “A lot of people live close to train tracks and highways. A humble thing like a microphone might help us understand your relationship to your environment, which then relates to your stress and your cardiovascular health.”

Yuen说：“研究表明，高水平的环境噪声会导致高水平的压力，从而影响血压。” “很多人住在火车和高速公路附近。 像麦克风这样的谦虚事物可能有助于我们了解您与环境的关系，然后与您的压力和心血管健康有关。”

健康(数据)风险 (Health (data) risks)

Fitbit knows a lot about you and your life — well beyond what its watches measure on your wrist. Because you fill out a profile on its phone app, and because Fitbit’s watches either contain their own GPS tracker or use the one in your phone, Fitbit knows your age, gender, height, and weight; where you live and where you go; and the entire history of your sleeping patterns, heartbeats, and activity. If you log what you eat, it even knows your nutritional background.

Fitbit对您和您的生活了解很多-远远超出了手表在手腕上的测量范围。 因为您在其手机应用程序上填写了个人资料，并且因为Fitbit的手表包含自己的GPS跟踪器或在手机中使用它，所以Fitbit知道您的年龄，性别，身高和体重； 你住在哪里，去哪里； 以及您的睡眠方式，心跳和活动的全部历史记录。 如果您记录下所吃的食物，它甚至会知道您的营养背景。

On one hand, Fitbit’s corporate pivot into disease detection means that protecting all of this data is even more essential. The company has, in the past, been the victim of data breaches that exposed usernames and passwords, potentially allowing bad actors to log into user accounts to view health information — and in Fitbit’s disease-detecting future, the leaked data could include your Covid-19 status. It would help if Fitbit offered multi-factor authentication as a native feature (the company says that’s coming soon).

一方面，Fitbit进入疾病检测的公司枢纽意味着保护所有这些数据变得更加重要。 过去，该公司一直是数据泄露的受害者，这些数据泄露暴露了用户名和密码 ，这可能使不良行为者登录用户帐户以查看健康信息-在Fitbit的疾病检测未来中，泄露的数据可能包括您的Covid- 19状态。 Fitbit将多因素身份验证作为本机功能提供 (该公司表示很快就会推出)会有所帮助。

For now, Fitbit notes that it encrypts all data between your device and the mothership; is entirely within your control to collect or delete; and is aggregated and anonymized when the company uses it for research. A Covid infection is also already what the government calls a reportable disease: You yourself are legally required to report it to your local health authority. And, of course, using Fitbit’s Covid-detection feature would be optional.

现在， Fitbit注意到它会加密您的设备和母舰之间的所有数据； 完全在您的控制范围内以进行收集或删除； 并且在公司将其用于研究时进行汇总和匿名化。 Covid感染也已经被政府称为可报告的疾病： 法律上要求您本人将其报告给当地的卫生部门。 而且，当然，使用Fitbit的Covid检测功能是可选的。

But as we now know, it’s not always enough for a technology company to invent a feature; it must also consider the unanticipated consequences. Some experts predict that corporations, schools, and stores could require that their employees, students, and customers use Covid contact-tracing software as a condition of entering the building, as a kind of “immunity passport.” (Already, you can’t enter an Apple Store without getting a temperature check.) And what would this data mean to the governments that already use contact-tracing data in ways that would horrify Americans?

但是，正如我们现在所知，技术公司发明功能并不总是足够的。 它还必须考虑意外的后果。 一些专家预测，公司，学校和商店可能会要求其员工，学生和客户使用Covid接触追踪软件作为进入建筑物的条件，这是一种“ 豁免护照” 。 (已经，您无法在没有进行温度检查的情况下进入Apple Store 。)这些数据对已经使用接触追踪数据以致使美国人感到恐惧的政府意味着什么？

On the other hand, having so much biological, geographical, and demographic information about you could someday permit Fitbit to make sophisticated, specific, truly valuable observations about you, like these:

另一方面，有一天，关于您的大量生物学，地理和人口信息可能使Fitbit对您进行复杂，具体，真正有价值的观察，例如：

• “The pollen count is very high where you are, which could trigger your asthma. Best to do your workout indoors today.”“您所在的位置花粉计数很高，这可能会引发哮喘。 今天最好在室内做运动。”
• “When you have more than one glass of wine at dinner, you wake up more often during that night’s sleep.”“当晚餐时喝一杯以上的葡萄酒时，您在那一夜的睡眠中醒来的频率会更高。”
• “On mornings when you run, you eat 22% fewer calories and fall asleep 11 minutes sooner.”“在跑步的早晨，您吃掉的卡路里减少了22％，并提前11分钟入睡。”
• “Your stress is elevated 45% every time you travel to Cincinnati, where your parents live.”“每次旅行到父母居住的辛辛那提，您的压力就会升高45％。”

Fitbit hasn’t promised any of these features — but all of it is possible, and for Yuen, it represents the ultimate goal line.

Fitbit没有承诺任何这些功能-但所有这些都是可能的，对于Yuen来说，它代表了最终的目标。

“I liken Fitbit, in its end state, as a mix between a loved one who cares about you, and your personal coach/companion,” he says. “For example, my dad can look at me and say, ‘You look like you’re getting sick,’ or, ‘It seems like you’re upset.’ He’ll notice these things well before I do — or perhaps because I’m in denial. With the wealth of data in these wearables, we may be able to get to a similar spot.”

他说：“在最终状态下，我把Fitbit看作是关心您的亲人和您的私人教练/伴侣的混合体。” “例如，我父亲可以看着我说，'你看起来好像在生病，'或'看起来你很沮丧。' 他会在我做之前就很好地注意到这些事情-也许是因为我拒绝了。 借助这些可穿戴设备中的大量数据，我们也许可以找到类似的位置。”

In other words, the hardware to make a new realm of invisible things visible is already here; we just need to parse the ocean of biometric data that it produces. “There’s a whole world that’s open to us,” Yuen says.

换句话说，使不可见事物的新领域可见的硬件已经在这里。 我们只需要解析其产生的生物特征数据的海洋即可。 “整个世界向我们开放，” Yuen说。

Update: A previous version of this article incorrectly described two of the Sense’s features. It does contain a speaker, and to activate an EDA measurement, the user rests their palm on the watch’s face.

更新：本文 的先前版本错误地描述了Sense的两个功能。 它确实包含一个扬声器，并且要激活EDA测量，用户将手掌放在手表的脸上。