Drawn-On-Skin Electronics Are The Future In Healthcare To Monitor, Prevent, And Treat Conditions

Human skin provides invaluable information that can be used by health care professionals and researchers to monitor, prevent and treat health conditions. Devices in direct contact with the skin — called bioelectronics — can receive information about the state of the heart, the condition of muscles, and the hydration and impedance (electrical conductivity) of the skin.

Wearable bioelectronics have seen many advances over the past decade in the form of patches that are soft, stretchable and flexible. The most challenging hurdle remaining to traditional bioelectronics is motion artifacts. Weak adhesion or imperfect conformability of the bioelectronic leads to inconsistent interface between skin and the device. The inconsistency introduces motion artifacts, which can interrupt or corrupt readings and lead healthcare professionals to misinterpret or misdiagnose illnesses.

Uses and Benefits of Drawn-on-Skin Electronics

Drawn-on-skin (DoS) electronics is a new bioelectronics platform for on-demand, multifunctional and motion artifact–free sensing. It is created by liquid functional inks drawn directly into stencils on the skin using a modified ballpoint pen. The inks are based on an Ag-PEDOT:PSS and poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) nanofibrils (P3HT-NF). The interface between the DoS and the skin is ultra-conformal, robust, stretchable and immune to motion once applied.

DoS electronics has a wide range of uses. For example, a wireless DoS electrocardiogram (ECG) monitoring system can be used at home for daily monitoring or in a clinical setting.