Wearables

Technology

In 2012, what technology that is ubiquitous in our everyday lives was used to recognize and measure DNA concentration?

The Integration of Sensors into Next-Generation Health Devices

How advanced sensor technologies driving the development of wearables and health-monitoring devices.

The Role of MEMS in Next-Gen Medical Devices

How microfabrication and MEMS technology are driving sensor-based medical devices.

Biosensors and Wearables for Health Insights

In a recent Medical Design Briefs podcast, Rob Batchelor, head of biosensors at Australia-based Nutromics, joined us to talk about continuous monitoring and biosensors for health insights. This article presents excerpts from that podcast.

Wearable Device for Cells Could Help Restore Brain Function

Wearable devices like smartwatches and fitness trackers interact with parts of our bodies to measure and learn from internal processes, such as our heart rate or sleep stages. Now, MIT researchers have developed wearable devices that may be able to perform similar functions for individual cells inside the body. Read on to learn more.

Soft Microelectronics Enable Wearable AI for Digital Health

A research team has introduced a groundbreaking wearable in-sensor computing platform. This platform is built on an emerging microelectronic device, an organic electrochemical transistor (OECT), invented explicitly for bioelectronics applications. Read on to learn more about it.

Wearable Laser Monitors Brain Blood Flow

Researchers have developed a laser-based device that can be placed on the head to noninvasively monitor changes in brain blood flow and volume. The new device could one day help save lives by offering a direct and simple way to assess stroke risk based on physiological markers rather than indirect markers like lifestyle factors. Read on to learn more.

Researchers Develop Clinically Validated, Wearable Ultrasound Patch for Continuous Blood Pressure Monitoring

A team of researchers at the University of California – San Diego has developed a new and improved wearable ultrasound patch for continuous and noninvasive blood pressure monitoring. Read on to learn more.

Nanofiber Patch for Psoriasis

Researchers have developed a patch for easier and more effective treatment of psoriasis. The method may also be used in treatment of other inflammatory skin diseases. The dry patch contains active ingredients for treatment of psoriasis reduces the frequency of use to once a day. Read on to learn more.

Implantable Sensors for Internal Health Monitoring

The advent of implantable sensor technologies has had a transformative impact on internal health monitoring. This episode looks into the advancements that allow for continuous, real-time data collection from within the human body, revolutionizing patient care and treatment strategies.

The Rise of Advanced Sensor Technologies

How sensors are reshaping the landscape of medical diagnostics, enabling quicker and more accurate health assessments.

2024 Create the Future Design Contest: Honorable Mentions

See the honorable mentions from the 2024 Create the Future Design Contest, including the Vivally System, the only FDA-cleared, closed-loop, athome, noninvasive neuromodulation device system; PyrAmes, a digital health company focused on fundamentally transforming healthcare delivery through continuous blood pressure (BP) monitoring that is accurate, wireless, and noninvasive; Battelle's platform for the discovery of novel polymeric nanoparticles (PNPs) delivery vehicles; and more.

Lifesaving Spongelike ‘Bandage’ Rapidly Stops Hemorrhaging

Without proper medical invention, injuries sustained from traffic collisions, serious workplace accidents, or weapons may result in fatal hemorrhaging. UCF researchers aim to prevent such bleeding in potentially deadly situations with a new hemostatic spongelike bandage with antimicrobial efficacy. Read on to learn more.

How to Design Reliable, Low-Power Wearable Medicine Injectors

Advances in IoT and electronic technology are enabling more personalized, continuous medical care. People with medical conditions that require a high degree of monitoring and continuous medication infusion can now take advantage of wearable medicine injection devices to treat their problems. Read on to learn more.

Finger Pouch Actuator Improves Rehab Gloves

Researchers have succeeded in adding finger straightening or extension to soft rehabilitation gloves through a novel foldable pouch actuator (FPA) without compromising the already existing functionality of finger bending or flexion. Read on to learn more about it.

How Printed Electronics Are Transforming Healthcare

The convergence of healthcare and technology is reshaping patient care, and printed electronics are pivotal in this transformation. Printed electronics offer promising solutions, enabling real-time monitoring and proactive patient management for improved outcomes. Read on to learn more.

A Band-Aid for the Heart? New 3D Printing Method Makes This, and Much More, Possible

In the quest to develop lifelike materials to replace and repair human body parts, scientists face a formidable challenge: Real tissues are often both strong and stretchable and vary in shape and size. A CU Boulder-led team has taken a critical step toward cracking that code. They’ve developed a new way to 3D print material that is at once elastic enough to withstand a heart’s persistent beating, tough enough to endure the crushing load placed on joints, and easily shapable to fit a patient’s unique defects. Read on to learn more.

High-Tech Bandages Could Fend Off Infections, Improve Healing

When wounds happen, we want them to heal quickly and without complications, but sometimes infections and other complications prevent it. Binghamton University Prof. Seokheun “Sean” Choi has some ideas about how to improve the healing process. Read on to learn about them.

Wearable Lung Patch Detects COPD

Researchers have developed a deep learning (DL) model that they paired with a wearable patch equipped with a highly sensitive sensor that can automatically detect wheezing sounds. The deep learning model has...

Transdermal Technology: Designing the World’s First Seven-Day Patch for Alzheimer’s

Transdermal technology has been around for a very long time. The popularity of patches, consisting of plant, animal or mineral extracts, dates back to the building of the pyramids in ancient Egypt and in Babylonian medicine, around 3000 BC. How can transdermal patches help in the fight against Alzheimer’s? Read this article to find out.

Noninvasive Method First to Continually Measure True Blood Pressure

A team of Caltech researchers has figured out a method to noninvasively and continually measure blood pressure anywhere on the body with next to no disruption to the patient. A device based on the new technique holds the promise to enable better vital-sign monitoring. Read on to learn more.

Wearable, Stretchable Sensor Detects Solid-State Skin Biomarkers

Researchers have developed a novel sensor that enables the continuous, real-time detection of solid-state epidermal bio-markers, a new category of health indicators. Read on to learn more.

Dissolvable Microneedle Patch Enables Local Delivery of Immunomodulatory Microparticles

A team searched for small molecules as drug candidates and identified a bifunctional antibiotic, azithromycin (AZM), that not only inhibits bacterial...

Finger Wrap Monitors Health

A sweat-powered wearable has the potential to make continuous, personalized health monitoring as effortless as wearing a Band-Aid. An electronic finger wrap monitors vital chemical levels — such as glucose,...

Highly Conductive Sensors for Wearables

To advance soft robotics, skin-integrated electronics, and biomedical devices, researchers have developed a 3D-printed material that is soft and stretchable — traits needed for matching the properties of tissues and organs — and that self-assembles. Read on to learn more.

Flexible Film Senses Nearby Movements

A soft, flexible film senses the presence of nearby objects without physically touching them. The study features the new sensor technology to detect eyelash proximity in blink-tracking glasses. Read on to learn more.

Monitor Measures Disease Markers

A wearable health monitor can reliably measure levels of important biochemicals in sweat during physical exercise. Read on to learn more about the 3D-printed monitor.

Videos of the Month

See the videos of the month, including one on a first-in-class medication that targets specific genetic mutations implicated in many types of cancer; one on new, scalable methods of developing battery- and solar-powered fibers; one on a nanofiber-based biodegradable millirobot, called Fibot, that can move in the intestines and degrade in response to the pH of its environment; and one on a new avenue in the attack against influenza viruses.

Wearable Devices Get Signal Boost from Innovative Material

An international team of researchers developed the material by embedding clusters of highly dielectric ceramic nanoparticles into an elastic polymer. The material was reverse-engineered to not only mimic skin elasticity and motion types, but also to adjust its dielectric properties to counter the disruptive effects of motion on interfacing electronics, minimize energy loss and dissipate heat.