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Eating too much salt raises blood pressure and increases the likelihood of heart complications for people who have hypertension, to monitor salt intake, researchers have developed a flexible and stretchable wireless sensing system designed to be comfortably worn in the mouth to measure the amount of sodium consume.
Based on an ultrathin, breathable elastomeric membrane, the sensor integrates with a miniaturized flexible electronic system that uses bluetooth technology to wirelessly report the sodium consumption to a smartphone or tablet. By monitoring sodium in real-time, the device could help people who need to restrict sodium intake and learn to change their eating habits and diet.
Details of the device are reported in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The device has been tested in three adult study participants who wore the sensor system for up to a week while eating both solid and liquid foods.
According to the American Heart Association, Americans on average eat more than 3,400 milligrams of sodium each day, far more than the limit of 1,500 milligrams per day it recommends. The association surveyed a thousand adults and found that one-third couldn’t estimate how much sodium they ate, and another 54 percent thought they were eating less than 2,000 milligrams of sodium a day.
The sodium sensing system could address excess salt intake by helping users track how much salt they consume, the device could have applications for eating behavior for diet management or therapeutics. Key to development of the intraoral sensor was replacement of traditional plastic and metal-based electronics with biocompatible and ultrathin components connected using mesh circuitry. Sodium sensors are available commercially.
The e sensing and electronics package was conformally integrated onto a soft material that users can tolerate, the sensor is comfortable to wear, and data from it can be transmitted to a smartphone or tablet. The flexible design began with computer modeling to optimize the mechanical properties of the device for use in the curved and soft oral cavity. The researchers then used model to design the actual nanomembrane circuitry and choose components.
The device can monitor sodium intake in real-time, and record daily amounts. Using a smartphone or tablet application, the system could advise users planning meals how much of their daily salt allocation they had already consumed. The device can communicate with a smartphone up to ten meters away.
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