An NFC-Enabled CMOS IC for a Wireless Fully Implantable Glucose Sensor

Abstract

This paper presents an integrated circuit (IC) that merges integrated optical and temperature transducers, optical interface circuitry, and a near-field communication (NFC)-enabled digital, wireless readout for a fully passive implantable sensor platform to measure glucose in people with diabetes. A flip-chip mounted LED and monolithically integrated photodiodes serve as the transduction front-end to enable fluorescence readout. A wide-range programmable transimpedance amplifier adapts the sensor signals to the input of an 11-bit analog-to-digital converter digitizing the measurements. Measurement readout is enabled by means of wireless backscatter modulation to a remote NFC reader. The system is able to resolve current levels of less than 10 pA with a single fluorescent measurement energy consumption of less than 1 μJ. The wireless IC is fabricated in a 0.6-μm-CMOS process and utilizes a 13.56-MHz-based ISO15693 for passive wireless readout through a NFC interface. The IC is utilized as the core interface to a fluorescent, glucose transducer to enable a fully implantable sensor-based continuous glucose monitoring system.

Design of a Programmable Passive SoC for Biomedical Applications Using RFID ISO 15693/NFC5 Interface

“…Table 7 presents a comparative view of the related works in this field. The work presented in [10] is an NFC enabled SoC which uses the communication protocol of ISO 15693 standard. The application area of the SoC is limited to glucose sensor measurement.…”

“…Table 1 presents an overview of the state-of-the-art SoCs for bio-medical applications. The NFC and RFID enabled ICs [8,10,11] are specifically used for glucose measurement. The SoC presented in [12] is reconfigurable and provides a possibility to integrate a wide range of sensor types (temperature, glucose, pH value and protein concentration) but it does not have an NFC communication interface.…”

Reconfigurable System for Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) and Near Field Communications (NFC)

“…ear field communications (NFC) are being used for identification or payment transactions, in ePassport or travel cards, and also in applications such as embedded sensors [1]. In these latter applications, NFC tags can be totally passive, such as the implantable glucose sensors in [2], but other NFC tags require small batteries, such as those described in [3], where NFC enabled devices collect patient data. In those cases, a small battery might be required, so one optimum case would be to do the charging from the same NFC reader.…”

State of the Art, Trends and Future of Bluetooth Low Energy, Near Field Communication and Visible Light Communication in the Development of Smart Cities

“…Currently, NFC is being used in a large variety of applications: education [53,54], tourism [55], authentication [56,57], health [58], transport and ticketing [59,60], retail [61], marketing [62], etc. Its main development appears to be focused on the integration of NFC chips into all kinds of wearables [63] and even in the human body, to serve as a means of identification and as a trigger for other more complex services.…”