Underwear sensors monitor health

Researchers integrated chemical sensors into two brands of briefs, which will allow the constant monitoring of blood pressure and heart rate. They found that printing sensors directly on the elastic waist of underwear offered the necessary tight direct contact with the skin and said the design will be of great benefit not just to the military but also to the healthcare and sport industries.

To create the sensors, Joseph Wang and colleagues at the University of California San Diego, La Jolla, screen-printed carbon electrode arrays directly onto the elastic bands of men’s underwear.

The tight contact and direct exposure to the skin allowed hydrogen peroxide and NADH, which are both associated with numerous biomedical processes, to be monitored. The researchers tested the special pants for their durability and found stresses associated with everyday wear, such as the folding or stretching of the clothing, did not affect the performance of the sensors.

Their work has been published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal ’Analyst’.