RAPID:COVID-19: A Low-Cost Disposable Wearable for Real-Time Tracking of the Risk of and Recovery to COVID-19, Influenza, and other Viral Infections

目前，世界在应对COVID-19等病毒性流行病方面准备不足。世界各地的检测试剂盒供应短缺，而且由于其症状与流感和普通感冒等其他常见感染非常相似，检测试剂盒供应短缺意味着医生只会对符合特定症状的患者进行检测，而其他人则不知道他们是否被感染。这导致数量不详的人（其中许多人可能已被感染）可能将病毒传播给他人。世界迫切需要一种方法，不仅仅根据他们自我报告的症状，对携带COVID-19的高风险人群进行定量分类。此外，那些被感染并在家隔离的人无法知道他们的康复进展如何和/或他们的症状是否足以需要住院治疗（在可能为时已晚之前）。所有这些不仅适用于COVID-19，也适用于未来可能席卷全球的任何病毒感染。因此，即使COVID-19检测最终可以大量使用，该项目开发的技术仍将有助于在未来的病毒爆发中帮助自我分类和自我监测受试者。RAPID项目的目的是研究和开发可穿戴平台技术，该技术可用于实时监测患者，以确定他们目前被感染的可能性，如果他们被感染，他们的康复过程如何进行。这将通过一种混合可穿戴设备来实现，该设备可以同时监测体温以检测发烧，并监测呼吸功能以测量咳嗽和呼吸短促。重要的是，在这里研究和开发的技术将被设计成极低的功耗，这样设备就可以通过能量收集方式供电，而不需要电池。整个平台采用小型集成电路，小型传感器阵列和超高效的磁性人体通信技术，整个平台将是一次性的，持续使用数周。记录的数据将通过无线传输到智能手机/智能手表应用程序，该应用程序可以收集大量不同用户空间的数据，用于人口健康分析。从规模上看，该设备的成本预计为0.10美元，因此不仅可以在美国使用，而且可以在整个发展中国家使用。通过以匿名形式从许多用户那里收集自愿提供的数据，开发的应用程序将具有流行病学应用程序，并有助于说明地方，国家和国际地理位置的可能感染率。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The world is currently vastly underprepared to deal with viral pandemics such as COVID-19. Testing kits around the world are in short supply, and since symptoms are so similar to other common infections such as influenza and the common cold, short testing supplies means doctors will only administer tests to patients who fit very specific symptoms – leaving others in the dark as to whether they are infected. This causes an unknown number of people – many who may be infected, to potentially spread the virus to others. The world desperately needs a way to quantitatively triage individuals who are at high risk of carrying COVID-19 based on more than just their self-reported symptoms. In addition, those who are infected and are quarantining at home have no way of knowing how they are progressing in their recovery and/or if their symptoms are sufficient to warrant hospitalization (before it may be too late). All of this is true not just for COVID-19, but for any future viral infection that may take the world by storm. Thus, even if COVID-19 tests eventually become available in large quantities, the technology developed in this program will still be useful to help self-triage and self-monitor subjects in future viral outbreaks. The purpose of this RAPID project is to research and develop wearable platform technology that can be used to monitor patients, in real time, to determine their likelihood of currently being infected, and if they are infected, how their recovery process is coming along. This will be accomplished via a hybrid wearable device that simultaneously monitors body temperature for fever detection, and respiration function for coughing and shortness of breath measures. Importantly, the technology to be researched and developed herein will be engineered from the ground up to be extremely low power, such that the device can be powered via energy harvesting means without a battery. Implemented with a small integrated circuit, a small sensor array, and ultra-efficient magnetic human body communication technology, the entire platform will be disposable and last for weeks. Recorded data will be wirelessly delivered to a smartphone/smartwatch app, which can collect data across a large and diverse user space for population health analysis. At scale, the device is expected to cost $0.10 USD, and thus could be used not only in the United States, but across the developing world. By aggregating volunteered data in an anonymous format from many users, the developed app will have epidemiologic applications, and help to illustrate likely infection rates across local, national, and international geographies.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.