Physiological Status Monitoring Nanorobotics

Military servicemen injured in battle require innovative medical capabilities to provide continuous assessment of their physiological status to operational medics in a hostile war environment. A non-invasive, internal physiological status monitoring system will enable medical personnel to continuously monitor multiple casualties at the same time, with data being transmitted wirelessly and in real-time to ensure timely action if deterioration of patient medical status occurs. Nanohmics, Inc. is already developing an ingestible capsule that monitors biomarkers in the gut fluid, and proposes to integrate on-board miniaturized electronics to monitor patient vital signs such as heart rate, respiratory rate, and core body temperature. In future, the list of biomarkers of interest for detection could be expanded, and medication could be stored on-board the pill and dispensed via remote medic control when specific patient criteria are met. The Nanohmics vital signs and biomarker measurement capsule (VitBiCap) will be the first of its kind to measure heart rate, respiratory rate, and core body temperature, as well as draw in a sample of gut fluid and measure biomarker targets of interest in real-time.