Development of a Wearable Near-Infrared Blood Alcohol Content Monitor

Project Summary AbstractThe United States alcoholic beverage market topped $Billion inselling enough alcohol for each American to consumelitersgallonsof pure alcohol inDue to alcohol consumptionandapos s long history and ample financial interestthere has been a great deal of research around alcohol and the benefits and detriments to consuming itDespite the commonality of alcohol consumption and the ability for users to abuse the intoxicantthere remains a stigma around monitoring blood alcohol contentBACin a public forume gbreathalyzers by police officers and breathalyzer controlled automobile ignitionsThis stigma generally holds true even when part of a clinical study or while seeking help for an addictionThusthere is still a need for a BAC monitoring device that remains out of site or can be camouflaged into everyday itemse gclothingjewelryaccessorieswhich has yet to be met be current systemsNear infrared spectroscopyNIRShas been used by Vivonics to monitor and report a number of physiologically relevant parametersStudies have shown the ability to use near infrared wavelengths to estimate the blood alcohol concentration with a low error ofBAClegally intoxicated BAC isThe proposed effort will apply this approach but tailor implementation in a way that enables a miniaturizedwearable device which is accurate despite variations in physiologyUtilizing this conceptthe goal of the proposed Phase I effort is to develop an accurate and temporally resolute BAC monitoring benchtop prototypeThe overall goal of the Phase I effort is to demonstrate feasibility of the miniaturized NIRS approachpaving the way for human subject testing in Phase IIThe long term goal of this program is to deliver an accurate and temporally resolute wearable BAC monitoring device that substantially improves subject compliance in clinical and academic researchThe proposed program would not only benefit the research communityproviding a tool to better understand how alcohol dose and frequency impacts physiological and physiological healthbut would also benefit the general public on a larger scale by translating the findings from the research community into more responsible and healthy alcohol consumption practices Project NarrativeAs proposedthis Phase I effort would aim at studying the optical spectral response of ethanol in the blood under controlled conditions and then translate the results into a benchtop prototype system that can estimate blood alcohol contentBACvia a miniaturized formatThe short term impact of the proposed effort would provide the research community with a better understanding of the spectroscopic characteristics of low molarity ethanol in the blood and would demonstrate the feasibility of detecting these pertinent ethanol concentrations via a miniaturizednoninvasive approachLong termthe proposed program would not only benefit the research communityproviding a tool to better understand how alcohol dose and frequency impacts physiological and physiological healthbut would also benefit the general public on a larger scale by translating the findings from the research community into more responsible and healthy alcohol consumption practices