Roboswab: A Covid-19 Thermal Imaging Detector Based on Oral and Facial Temperatures

Abstract

The SARS-CoV-2 virus has been the precursor of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The symptoms of COVID-19 begin with the common cold and then become very severe, such as those of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). Currently, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is used to detect COVID-19 accurately, but it causes some side effects to the patient when the test is performed. Therefore, the proposed "Roboswab" was developed that uses thermal imaging to measure non-contact facial and oral temperature. This study focuses on the performance of the proposed equipment in measuring facial and oral temperature from various distances. Face detection also involves checking whether the subject is wearing a mask or not. Image processing methods with thermal imaging and robotic manipulators are integrated into a contact-free detector that is inexpensive, accurate, and painless. This research has successfully detected masked or non-masked faces and accurately detected facial temperature. The results showed that the accurate measurement of facial temperature with a mask is 90% with an error of +/- 0.05%, while it was 100% without a mask. On the other hand, the oral temperature was measured with 97% accuracy and an error of less than 5%. The optimal distance of the Roboswab to the face for measuring temperature is an average of 60 cm. The Roboswab tool equipped with masked or non-masked face detection can be used for early detection of COVID-19 without direct contact with patients.

Keywords

• thermal imaging
• face and oral temperature
• covid-19
• mask
• roboswab