I-Corps: Remote Blood Analysis for Digital Animal Health

这个I-Corps项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力是开发一种植入式传感器和测量系统，以数字化方式监测饲料动物的健康状况。所提出的植入式传感器平台测量广泛的健康生物标志物，如温度、氧气、葡萄糖、妊娠激素和乳酸盐，而无需昂贵的抽血或其他体液。饲养场中动物的发病率和死亡率在15% - 45%之间，仅牛呼吸道疾病（BRD）就造成10亿美元的经济负担。此外，拟议的技术有可能通过在传统方法之前预测疾病天数来减少抗生素和饲料动物使用的药物。该系统使用低成本的无源传感器植入物，提供了比其他有源电子可穿戴设备成本低得多的解决方案。I-Corps项目基于开发一种米粒大小的发光水凝胶植入物和一种能够“读取”植入物的数据收集仪器系统。 生物传感器被植入动物的皮下，距离组织表面仅几毫米。 植入设备被植入一种分子，当附着在目标生物标志物（如氧气）上并被特定波长的光激发时，该分子会发光。 阅读仪器的尺寸与金属探测器相似，产生激发光并测量植入物的发射返回光信号。 使用皮肤附着阅读仪器的类似的可植入生物传感器在市场上是可商购的，并且被监管机构批准用于连续测量人体中的氧气。 与使用皮肤附着阅读器的人类应用不同，所提出的技术使用用于牛肉和乳制品应用的坚固的户外系统，每天多次读取几厘米距离的植入传感器，以早期检测疾病。迄今为止，植入物和读取器系统，以询问植入式氧气和温度传感器已被设计用于在12厘米的距离。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of an implantable sensor and measurement system to monitor the health of feed animals digitally. The proposed implantable sensor platform measures a wide range of health biomarkers such as temperature, oxygen, glucose, pregnancy hormones, and lactate without the expensive of drawing blood or other bodily fluids. Morbidity and mortality rates of animals in feedlots range between 15% - 45% with Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD) alone having an economic burden of $1 billion. In addition, the proposed technology has the potential to lower the use of antibiotics and medications used with feed animals by predicting illness days before conventional methods. The system uses a low-cost passive sensor implant that offers a significantly lower cost solution than alternative active electronic wearable devices.This I-Corps project is based on the development of a luminescent hydrogel implant that is the size of a grain of rice and an instrumentation system for data collection that is able to “read” the implant. The biosensor is implanted under the animal’s hide just a few millimeters below the tissue surface. The implant device is seeded with a molecule that lights up when attached to a target biomarker such as oxygen and excited with light of a certain wavelength. The reading instrument, similar in size to a metal detector, produces the excitation light and measures the emission return light signal from the implant. Similar implantable biosensors that use skin-attached reading instruments are commercially available in the market and are approved by regulators for continuously measuring oxygen in humans. Unlike human applications that use a skin attached reader, the proposed technology uses a rugged outdoor system for beef and dairy applications to read the implant sensor at a distance of few centimeters several times a day for early detection of illness. To date, implants and a reader system to interrogate implantable oxygen and temperature sensors have been designed for use at a distance of 12 cm.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.