Method and apparatus for detection of drowsiness and quantitative control of biological processes

An apparatus for monitoring a biological process, said apparatus comprising a processor programmed to perform a method, said method comprising:

• receiving image data of an object having one or more features, said image data corresponding to frames comprising a plurality of pixels;
• dividing each frame into one or more regions based on the one or more features and each region into one or more subregions;
• filtering pixels in each subregion according to a pixel intensity range to provide a filtered output of pixels;
• defining for each frame a first area within each subregion, said first area defined by one or more predetermined shape equations according to a shape of a feature to be monitored in the subregion and defining for each frame a second area within each subregion, said second area adjacent to said first area;
• and
• evaluating for each frame the number of filtered output of pixels in the first area for each subregion to transform the image data to a scalar feature signal for each subregion wherein said step of evaluating comprises determining for each frame the difference between the number of filtered output pixels in the first area and the number of filtered output pixels in the second area and outputting a value of the difference to produce the scalar feature signal for each subregion.