MICRO ELECTRONIC PILL

ABSTRACT :A Microelectronic pill is a basically a multichannel sensor used for remote biomedical
measurements using micro technology. This has been developed for the internal study and detection of diseases and abnormalities in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract where restricted access prevents the use of traditional endoscope. The measurement parameters for detection include real time remote recording of temperature, pH, conductivity and dissolved oxygen in the GI tract.This paper deals with the design of the Microelectronic pill which mainly consists of an outer biocompatible capsule encasing 4 channel micro sensors, a control chip, a discrete component radio transmitter and 2 silver oxide cells.

INTRODUCTION
The invention of the transistor enabled the first radio telemetry capsules, which utilized simple circuits for in vivo telemetric studies of the gastro-intestinal tract. These units could only transmit from a single sensor channel, and were difficult to assemble due to the use of discrete components. The measurement parameters consisted of temperature, pH or pressure, and the first attempts of conducting real-time noninvasive physiological measurements suffered from poor reliability, low sensitivity, and short lifetimes of the devices. The first successful pH gut profiles were achieved in 1972, with subsequent improvements in sensitivity and lifetime. Single-channel radio telemetry capsules have since been applied for the detection of disease and abnormalities in the GI tract where restricted access prevents the use of traditional endoscopy. Most radio telemetry capsules utilize laboratory type sensors such as glass pH electrodes, resistance thermometers, or moving inductive coils as pressure transducers. The relatively large size of these sensors limits the functional complexity of the pill for a given size of capsule. Adapting existing semiconductor fabrication technologies to sensor development has enabled the production of highly functional units for data collection, while the exploitation of integrated circuitry for sensor control, signal conditioning, and wireless transmission, and has extended the concept of single-channel radio telemetry to remote distributed sensing from microelectronic pills.

IMAGES

CONCLUSION
Thus we can see that an integrated sensor array system has been incorporated in amobile remote analytical microelectronic pill, designed to perform real-time measurements of the GI tract, providing the first wireless transmitted multichannelrecordings of analytical parameters. Further work will focus on developing photopatternablegel electrolytes and oxygen and cationselective membranes. The microelectronic pill will beminiaturized for medical and veterinary applications by incorporating the transmitter on siliconand reducing power consumption by improving the data compression algorithm and utilizing aprogrammable standby power mode.The generic nature of the microelectronic pill makes it adaptable for use in corrosiveenvironments related to environmental and industrial applications, such as the evaluation of water quality, pollution detection, fermentation process control and the inspection of pipelines.The integration of radiation sensors and the application of indirect imaging technologies suchas ultrasound and impedance tomography, will improve the detection of tissue abnormalitiesand radiation treatment associated with cancer and chronic inflammation.In the future, one objective will be to produce a device, analogous to a micro totalanalysis system (TAS) or lab on a chip sensor which is not only capable of collecting andprocessing data, but which can transmit it from a remote location. The overall concept will beto produce an array of sensor devices distributed throughout the body or the environment,capable of transmitting high-quality information in real-time