Abstract

Microneedle-Electrochemical Sensors: Towards a Lab Under the Skin

Joseph Wang, Chair of Nanoengineering, SAIC Endowed Professor, Director at Center of Wearable Sensors, University of California-San Diego

Wearable sensors have received a major recent attention owing to their considerable promise for monitoring the wearer’s health and wellness. The medical interest for wearable systems arises from the need for monitoring patients over long periods of time. These devices have the potential to continuously collect vital health information from a person’s body and provide this information to them or their healthcare provider in a timely fashion. Such sensing platforms provide new avenues to continuously and non-invasively monitor individuals and can thus tender crucial real-time information regarding a wearer’s health.

This presentation will focus on our recent efforts for using microneedle sensor arrays for simultaneous minimally-invasive real-time monitoring of multiple biomarkers. Owing to the arrayed nature of the microneedle structures, various target analytes can be detected at different individually-addressable microneedles for realizing such multiplexed sensing operation. The preparation and characterization of such wearable electrochemical microneedle sensor arrays will be described, along with their current status, advantages, latest applications, and future prospects and challenges.