UNOPIEZO · Unobtrusive printed piezoelectric sensors for non-invasive biosignal monitoring

Unobtrusive printed piezoelectric sensors for non-invasive biosignal monitoring

Continuous, large-scale health monitoring of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk population carries significant benefits to the society (e.g. decreased mortality and treatment costs due to early disease detection), but is currently not possible because of the lack of unobtrusive, affordable and accurate bio-signal sensors. This MSCA project proposes to solve these issues through development of ultra-thin (< 10 µm thick) sensors which attach conformably to the skin and improve the mechanical coupling between the skin-sensor interface thereby resulting in highly unobtrusive user experience and accurate signal reproduction. Furthermore, cost-effective additive fabrication technologies are employed to make the devices affordable and to enable their mass-scale fabrication required for large-scale screening of the whole risk population. The overall research objectives of the project are: RO1: Determination of material parameters for modelling and application for ethical permission RO2: Development of engineering design rules for printed ultra-thin piezoelectric sensors RO3: Development of printing processes to fabricate the designed structures RO4: Demonstration of device performance in bio-signal measurement The expected outcomes of the ROs are: RO1: Determination of mechanical, electrical and piezoelectric material parameters required for modelling in RO2. Start of application procedure for ethical permission for human studies. RO2: Fundamental understanding how to maximize the sensitivity through material choices (e.g. substrate elastic moduli, plain strain bending modulus), manipulation of the device dimensions (e.g. piezoelectric material thickness, substrate vs. piezoelectric thickness ratio), and device architecture (e.g. charge collector layout). Understanding how to improve mechanical coupling between sensor and skin. Implemented through a finite element model (FEM). Design and fabrication of ultra-thin battery free data transmission unit (DTU). RO3: Printed unobtrusive, affordable and accurate ultra-thin piezoelectric sensors RO4: Clinically accurate pulse wave signal measured from the carotid/radial artery. Verification done using simultaneous measurement with state-of-the art devices used currently in hospitals.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union