Flow sensing for an artificial pancreas

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The long term objective of diabetes treatment is to create an artificial pancreas to substitute for the role of the biological pancreas in patients. This artificial pancreas must constantly measure glucose and respondwith an appropriate dose of insulin and/or glucagon to achieve an artificial analog to homeostasis. However, the artificial pancreas is subject to limitations not experienced in biological systems, and delivery of insulin by pumps has been known to be made inaccurate by factors such as the presence of magnetic fields, occlusions and disconnects in the lines, and even travel at high altitudes. As a result, patients can experience out-of-control glucose levels for hours before they or the artificial pancreassystem becomes aware of a problem, and this results in degraded clinical outcomes. Insulin pumps are subject to such errors because of a simple but significant limitation - they cannot directly measure the rate of fluid flow. Pumps today estimate the