Silicon carbide is a well-known wide-band gap semiconductor traditionally used in power electronics and solid-state lighting due to its extremely low intrinsic carrier concentration and high thermal conductivity. What is only recently being discovered is that it possesses excellent compatibility within the biological world. Since publication of the first edition of Silicon Carbide Biotechnology: A Biocompatible Semiconductor for Advanced Biomedical Devices and Applications five years ago [1], significant progress has been made on numerous research and development fronts. In this paper three very promising developments are briefly highlighted – progress towards the realization of a continuous glucose monitoring system, implantable neural interfaces made from free-standing 3C-SiC, and a custom-made low-power ‘wireless capable’ four channel neural recording chip for brain-machine interface applications.
It has been shown that changes in blood glucose can be sensed with an RF antenna made from silicon carbide (SiC) operating at 10 GHz. Therefore a SiC antenna patch could operate as an active sensor or as a passive sensor at 5.8 GHz for a continuous glucose monitoring system. The properties of SiC make this material ideal for biomedical applications and devices as it is not only biocompatible but also has great sensing capability. The permittivity and conductivity of the blood is glucose dependent. Thus implanting the antenna in the fatty tissue facing the muscle and blood results should result in a shift of the resonant frequency of the antenna with glucose levels. In the active sensor approach, a power supply and internal in-vivo circuitry with protection would be required. In the passive sensor approach, external circuitry sends a signal to the implanted antenna and is received back again, detecting any signal variations. Simulations in HFSS™ show that that an implanted sensor placed 2 mm from the muscle in fatty tissue would experience an approximate shift in resonant frequency of 12.3 MHz for a blood glucose change of 500 mg/dl.
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