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Abstract
The human hand is considered to be the terminus of the nervous system. It contains
numerous capillary vessels, and it plays an important role in the regulation of the
autonomic nervous system. We have used infrared thermography and ultrasound Doppler
flowmetry to investigate characteristics of the temperature variation of the hand
and the blood flow after cold stimuli. We have also developed an image processing
algorithm to measure temperature of various parts of the hand via sequential thermal
images. Measured results show that local cold stimuli will induce oscillation of temperature,
which may be due to neuroregulation during rewarming. Finally, in order to explain
the mechanism of autonomic nervous system (ANS) regulation we have developed an ANS
regulation model on the basis of the knowledge of the physiology and bioheat transfer.
The results computed using our model are in good agreement with the experimental results.