A group of specialists from Oregon State University is building up a contact lens that can detect blood sugar levels for diabetics, blood toxicity and even detect early signs of cancer. They showed their study on Tuesday at the 253rd National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society. The innovation will use a transparent biosensor that can possibly identify symptoms of significantly more diseases in one day.
The specialists, headed by the Oregon State professor Gregory Hermann, built up the transparent biosensor with sheets of compound gallium zinc oxide (IGZO). It is a semiconductor also used as a part of smartphones, tablets, and TVs with higher resolutions.
Hermann gauges or estimates that 2,500 biosensors can be inserted in just one millimeter of a contact lens with IGZO. Meanwhile, the sensors are still in the on-the-process stage, as per Indiatimes.
With the existence of the IGZO transistors and the glucose oxidase, it is made feasible for the biosensor to simplify glucose. With that, they will have the capacity to make the contact lens that can detect blood sugar levels for diabetics with simply the patient's tears.
It is an exertion of the team to keep checking a patient with diabetes' glucose levels. The customary strategy these days utilizes electrodes that are embedded under the diabetic's skin. Contingent upon the individual, this strategy could be difficult and even cause skin disease and contamination.
The contact lens, however, will be a more secure and more functional option later on. And because the materials expected to make the contact lens are easily accessible today, the scientists are significantly more positive about the tech's development to be considerably more revolutionary.
Furthermore, there are many data that can be found on a man's tears. Clearly, it contains lactate to detect sepsis and liver ailment, dopamine for glaucoma, urea for renal capacities, and proteins for cancers, as what Hermann told the Gizmodo.
Having the objective of extending to numerous sensors, the team anticipates or envisions the contact lens that can detect blood sugar levels will one day have the capacity to identify more medical conditions like cancer. The study is distributed in the journal Nanoscale and Applied Materials and Interfaces.
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