Adhesive film turns smartwatch into biochemical health monitoring system

UCLA engineers have designed a thin adhesive film that could upgrade a consumer smartwatch into a powerful health monitoring system. The system looks for chemical indicators found in sweat to give a real-time snapshot of what ’s happening inside the body. Astudy detailing the technology was published inthe journal  Science Advances.Smartwatches can already help keep track of how far you ’ve walked, how much you’ve slept and your heart rate. Newer models even promise to monitor blood pressure. Working with a tethered smartphone or other devices, someone can use a smartwatch to keep track of those health indicators over a long period of time.Whatthese watchescan ’t do, yet, is monitor your body chemistry. For that, they need to track biomarker molecules found in body fluids that are highly specific indicators of our health, such as glucose and lactate, which tell how wellyour body ’s metabolism is working.To address that need, the researchers engineered a disposable,double-sidedfilmthat attaches to the underside of a smartwatch. The film can detect molecules such as metabolites and certain nutrients that are present in body sweat in very tiny amounts. They also built a custom smartwatch and an accompanying app to record data.“The inspiration for this work came from recognizing that we already have more than 100 million smartwatches and other wearable tech sold worldwide that have powerful data-collection, computation and transmission capabilities, ” said study le...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news