New wearable electronic health patches are cheap to produce, may outperform current monitoring tools

A patent-pending manufacturing process detailed in a paper published to Advanced Materials may very well pave the way for exciting new biotechnological solutions in the years to come.

The team behind the study, researchers in the Cockrell School of Engineering at the University of Texas (Austin), has formally detailed their breakthrough manufacturing process that drastically reduces the cost for creating wearable electronic health monitoring devices.

Their solution — disposable, tattoo-like health monitoring patches that can be manufactured for a fraction of the cost of today’s health monitoring devices. 

Now, while we’ve all seen iterations of a tattoo-like monitoring device before, the “breakthrough” in this instance is the team’s repeatable “cut-and-past” method. This solution is so efficient, it reduces the manufacturing time from a couple of days to just twenty minutes. 

Breaking it down, the entire process takes just two steps, starting with inexpensive, pre-fabricated, industrial-quality metal deposited on polymer sheets. An electronic mechanical cutter is used to form patterns on these sheets, after which all of the excess material is removed. Electronics are then printed onto any remaining polymer adhesives, including temporary tattoo films. 

Worth noting — the cutter in the first step is programmable, so the size of the patch and pattern can be easily customized on an as-needed basis. 

“One of the most attractive aspects of epidermal electronics is their ability to be disposable,” said Assistant Professor Nanshu Lu, who led this research. “If you can make them inexpensively, say for $1, then more people will be able to use them more frequently. This will open the door for a number of mobile medical applications and beyond.”

Also worth pointing out is the fact that this method does not require a clean room (as opposed to the current production process for creating ultrathin wearable electronic devices). This is due in large part to the fact that the manufacturing technique relies on freeform manufacturing, which is like 3D printing, but different in the sense that material is being removed instead of added. 

“These initial prototype patches can be adapted to roll-to-roll manufacturing that can reduce the cost significantly for mass production,” said Deji Akinwande, an associate professor and materials expert in the Cockrell School. “In this light, Lu's invention represents a major advancement for the mobile health industry.”

In terms of testing the patches out, the devices proved capable of picking up body signals more capably than those taken by existing medical devices. They also found that the patch conforms nearly perfectly to the skin which, in turn, minimizes motion-induced false signals and errors. 

Looking ahead, the team believes that due to the incredible sensitivity with which these patches can operate, humans will be able to use the patch in order to maneuver a prosthetic hand or limb using muscle signals.

Immediately speaking, Lu explained the team does have a primary focus: “We are trying to add more types of sensors including blood pressure and oxygen saturation monitors to the low-cost patch.” 

Via the University of Texas