Closed Loop Precision Medicine – From Smart Bandages to Ingestible Diagnostics

The speaker will introduce a new paradigm of “Human in the loop” precision medicine, made possible by advances in flexible sensors, microfluidics, drug delivery, and electronics. The closed loop approach is expected to be more effective in improving the health outcomes of individuals across broad demographics, as opposed to the current open-loop one-sizefits- all approach to medicine. The presentation will draw on examples from the speaker’s own interdisciplinary research projects. For instance, the speaker will showcase a novel toolkit of sensors, microfluidics, electronics, and drug delivery, all integrated onto a surgical suture, which realizes the vision of tissue-embedded diagnostics. Even electronic transistors and integrated circuits can be created on a single thread, giving rise to “free-form three dimensional integrated circuits.” The use of textile threads offers unique advantages such as wide availability, affordability, versatility of materials, and easy textile-based processing. The talk will also feature a project that employs additive manufacturing and laser micromachining to develop smart lab-on-a-pill devices that can spatially sample the gut microbiome in vivo. These ingestible pills have the potential to capture the spatial microbial biogeography of the gut, providing valuable insights into host-microbiome interactions and opening up a new realm of ingestible diagnostics compared to traditional fecal analysis. The presentation will also touch upon other flexible bioelectronic platforms such as “sweat sensing patches” and “gas sensing textiles,” highlighting key advancements made by the speaker and his group in realizing this new vision for bioelectronics. The talk will conclude with a forward-looking perspective on the field of bioelectronics and the exciting possibilities it holds.