Flexible bio-degradable electronics for on-skin mouse ECG monitoring

动物模型（特别是小鼠）广泛用于临床前测试和发现生物学。这个博士将专注于非侵入性系统的材料，用于小鼠生命体征监测。这将i）为UoM的即时临床前心血管研究提供重要的进展，ii）推动研究中动物使用的改进（主要的N3 R承诺），以及iii）提供适用于广泛临床前测试情况的设备。CI Bechtold的实验室目前的工作重点是一天中可能危及生命的心律失常的患病率。这项工作建立在许多EPSRC资助的项目之上，这些项目调查了人类皮肤上使用的柔性印刷电子产品。这些纹身是“临时纹身”，类似于给孩子们的擦纹身，但现在增加了电子设备。这项工作是与高价值制造弹射器合作完成的，目的是研究大规模生产的系统和工艺的放大和适用性。在这个博士学位中，我们将寻求建立在这个基础上，并修改我们目前的方法，使它们适合在鼠标上使用。这样做的目的是使鼠标的传感负担有一个台阶式的变化。目前的心脏和运动传感器被植入，从而增加了动物的压力和福利负担。有一个显着的愿望，从研究界改善他们的设计。要做到这一点，皮肤上的设备必须小得多，需要小特征尺寸打印。它们还必须易于放在鼠标上，需要研究新的基底以获得柔性/拉伸性。

Animal models (particularly mice) are widely used for pre-clinical testing and discovery biology. This PhD will focus on materials for non-invasive systems for mouse vital sign monitoring. This will i) provide an important advance for immediate pre-clinical cardiovascular research at UoM, ii) drive refinement of animal use in research (a major N3Rs commitment), and iii) provide a device that will be applicable to a wide range of pre-clinical test situations. Current work in CI Bechtold's lab focuses on time-of-day prevalence of potentially life threatening cardiac arrhythmias.The work builds on a number of EPSRC funded projects investigating flexible printed electronics for on-skin use by humans. These operate as "temporary tattoos", similar to rub-on tattoos given to children, but now with electronics added. This work has been done in collaboration with the high value manufacturing catapult to investigate scale-up and the suitability of systems and processes for mass production. In this PhD we will seek to build on this base and modify our current approaches to make them suitable for on-mouse use. The aim is to make a step change in the burden that sensing typically places on a mouse. Current heart and motion sensors are implanted, thus increasing stress to the animal and welfare burden. There is a significant desire from the research community for improving their design. To do this, on-skin devices have to be much smaller, necessitating small feature size printing. They also have to be easy to put on the mouse, necessitating investigating new substrates for flexibility/strechability.