ParkEMG · A wearable high-density electromyography system for real-world monitoring and diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease

Parkinson’s disease (PD) affects over 10 million people worldwide and remains one of the most challenging neurological disorders to diagnose and monitor. Current clinical practice relies mainly on subjective evaluations and indirect measures, which limits accurate tracking of disease progression and the development of personalized therapies. There is a clear unmet need for objective, reliable, and user-friendly biomarkers that can be measured in real-world conditions. This Proof of Concept develops ParkEMG, an intelligent wearable platform conceived as the first “Holter for the motor nervous system.” The device integrates High-Density Electromyography (HD-EMG) and inertial sensing with embedded intelligence. This dual-sensor strategy records relevant neural information underlying the pathological condition, instead of focusing on its external motor manifestations. Building on ERC-funded advances in neural decoding, ParkEMG will focus on quantifying cortico-muscular activity in the beta band and movement biomarkers such as bradykinesia and tremor, offering new windows into PD pathophysiology. The project will advance through hardware miniaturization, firmware and algorithm development, pilot validation in healthy volunteers and PD patients, and an iterative design cycle toward a minimum viable product. In parallel, structured market and IP assessments will guide exploitation. By bridging cutting-edge neurotechnology with real-world usability, ParkEMG could enable more reliable and faster diagnosis of PD, objective monitoring, and more effective treatment, ultimately improving quality of life for millions of patients.