Behavior Guided Design of Materials, Mechanics and Electromagnetics for Biosymbiotic Electronics

Philipp Gutruf<br/><br/>Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Electrical and Computer Engineering, Bio5 Institute, Neuroscience GIDP University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA.;<br/><br/>The concept of digital medicine, which relies on streams of continuous information from the body to gain insight into health status, manage disease and predict onset health problems, is currently relying on biosensors with limited chronic capabilities.^[1]^[2] Key technological hurdles that slow the proliferation of this approach are means by which clinical grade biosingals are continuously obtained without frequent user interaction.^[3] To overcome these hurdles, solutions in power supply and interface strategies that maintain high fidelity readouts and function chronically are critical. Current approaches for high fidelity recordings typically rely on adhesive interfaces that are subject to epidermal turnover, limiting sensor lifetime. Additionally, they rely on electrochemical power supplies which are subject to frequent recharge, add bulk and weight, require user interaction and introduce motion artefacts. Here we introduce a new class of devices that overcomes the limitations of current approaches by utilizing context aware mechanical and electromagnetic design facilitated through digital human behavior assessment to create unique personalized devices optimized to the wearer. Specifically, we introduce new methods to use behavioral analysis of a user group to shape design to enable indefinite device lifetimes.^[4] These elastomeric, 3D printed and laser structured constructs, called biosymbiotic devices, enable adhesive-free interfaces and the inclusion of high performance, far field energy harvesting to facilitate continuous wireless and battery-free operation of multimodal and multi device, high-fidelity biosensing in an at-home setting without user interaction. We present devices that can operate over weeks at the time, enable new sensing paradigms such as circumferential muscle strain, high fidelity absolute position sensing, mK resolution thermography and 3D printed optofluidics to capture an encompassing and evolving record of health. The impact of this approach is also showcased in wearable devices that are low profile, soft and can transmit high fidelity biosignal data over tens of miles of distance without cell connection uninterrupted over weeks without user interaction.<br/><b>References</b><br/>[1] T. R. Ray, J. Choi, A. J. Bandodkar, S. Krishnan, P. Gutruf, L. Tian, R. Ghaffari, J. A. Rogers, <i>Chem. Rev.</i> <b>2019</b>, <i>119</i>, 5461.<br/>[2] J. Heikenfeld, A. Jajack, J. Rogers, P. Gutruf, L. Tian, T. Pan, R. Li, M. Khine, J. Kim, J. Wang, <i>Lab Chip</i> <b>2018</b>, <i>18</i>, 217.<br/>[3] T. Stuart, L. Cai, A. Burton, P. Gutruf, <i>Biosens. Bioelectron.</i> <b>2021</b>, 113007.<br/>[4] S. Tucker, K. K. Albert, I. I. Christian, M. D. Thomas, P. Roberto, H. Jessica, J. Megan, F. Max, L. Thomas, U. Paul, G. Philipp, <i>Sci. Adv.</i> <b>2021</b>, <i>7</i>, eabj3269.