Category Archives: Applications

Defining and exploiting value proposition is an essential part of wearable technology’s journey from early adopters into mass markets, and sensor platforms enable the key value proposition in most wearable devices today. This is why made-for-wearable sensors are being developed around the world, and this is why IDTechEx Research finds that made-for-wearable sensors will represent 42% of all sensors in wearable devices in 2026, up from a measly 7% in 2015.

There will be a $5.5 billion market for sensors used in wearable technology applications by 2025, according to IDTechEx’s best-selling research report on the topic. With detailed coverage of the 15 most prominent sensor types in wearables today, this report gives a thorough overview of the technology, challenges and opportunities behind one of the key components behind the success of wearable technology.

Fig 1. First and second wave wearable sensors. Source: IDTechEx Research report "Wearable Sensors 2015-2025: Market Forecasts, Technologies, Players" (www.IDTechEx.com/wtsensors)

Fig 1. First and second wave wearable sensors. Source: IDTechEx Research report “Wearable Sensors 2015-2025: Market Forecasts, Technologies, Players” (www.IDTechEx.com/wtsensors)

Overcoming the barriers to adoptions

However, key hurdles must be surpassed in order for these sensor technologies to realize their full potential and penetrate key vertical markets. Healthcare is perhaps the best example, where regulatory processes and liability issues remain extremely prominent. Leading doctors admit that those who fail to adopt of technology in the form of digital health or otherwise will “fall by the way side” as advances occur. However, until all of the parties (device manufacturers, physicians, insurance companies, patients, and the lawyers of all the above) understand a clear system of liability, this remains a significant barrier to adoption.

New sensor technologies unlock new markets

Wearable sensor systems have already begun to unlock new markets. The textile and electronics industry has started to merge together around e-textiles. In the earliest products reaching the market, advances in low-energy communication can be paired with new made-for-wearable sensor types based on textiles and inks that are increasingly washable, comfortable and reliable. The current commercial focus here is on high value sport and fitness applications in the short term, but this will spread to wider industries including healthcare, home textiles, and industrial spaces in the next 2-5 years.

The IDTechEx report concludes that these sensor types will climb to huge volumes in the coming decade. As the number of wearable devices and the number of sensors per device both increase rapidly, sensors used to detect motion (stretching, deformation, etc.), force and pressure will be one of the largest winners, growing at 40% CAGR. The technology landscape here is in a period of divergence. Introduction of stretchable and washable inks, electroactive polymers, textile electrodes and printed piezoelectric sensors add to traditional techniques like inductive sensors using conductive elastomers or otherwise.

This broad technology landscape is a challenge for product designers. With many different materials come different requirements for connector types, electrical specifications, data algorithms and more. It will take some time for clear winners to emerge, and many large companies are still hedging their bets.

Fig 2. Technology landscape. Source: IDTechEx Research report "Wearable Sensors 2015-2025: Market Forecasts, Technologies, Players" (www.IDTechEx.com/wtsensors)

Fig 2. Technology landscape. Source: IDTechEx Research report “Wearable Sensors 2015-2025: Market Forecasts, Technologies, Players” (www.IDTechEx.com/wtsensors)

Sensor fusion

In 2015, half of all wearable sensors are based on MEMS technologies. Inertial measurement units (IMUs) are found in every smartwatch and fitness tracker, making the most of mature MEMS components that are reliable, familiar and cheap.

However, the challenge here is in turning raw data into useful, or ‘actionable’ data. Sensor fusion is the process of combining sensor outputs from multiple sensors to gain greater total insight. The most common example is using individual xyz acceleration and rotation data (e.g. from a 6-axis IMU) into motion data. This in turn can be used to count steps, differentiate between activity types, and so on. It is here that MEMS IMUs see more use cases. For example, they are used alongside optical sensors to manage motion artefacts experienced in optical heart rate monitoring. This was a far more traditional use of such components in physiological analytics, and now the wearable technology industry is beginning to come full circle.

To learn more about the trends with IMUs, stretch and pressure sensors, and all of the other prominent and emerging sensor types used in wearable technology today and in the future, see IDTechEx’s comprehensive report: Wearable Sensors 2015-2025: Market Forecasts, Technologies, Players.

Scientists and engineers are engaged in a global race to make new materials that are as thin, light and strong as possible. These properties can be achieved by designing materials at the atomic level, but they are only useful if they can leave the carefully controlled conditions of a lab.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have now created the thinnest plates that can be picked up and manipulated by hand.

Even though they are less than 100 nanometers thick, the researchers’ plates are strong enough to be picked up by hand and retain their shape after being bent and squeezed. Credit: University of Pennsylvania

Despite being thousands of times thinner than a sheet of paper and hundreds of times thinner than household cling wrap or aluminum foil, their corrugated plates of aluminum oxide spring back to their original shape after being bent and twisted.

Like cling wrap, comparably thin materials immediately curl up on themselves and get stuck in deformed shapes if they are not stretched on a frame or backed by another material.

Being able to stay in shape without additional support would allow this material, and others designed on its principles, to be used in aviation and other structural applications where low weight is at a premium.

The study was led by Igor Bargatin, the Class of 1965 Term Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics in Penn’s School of Engineering and Applied Science, along with lab member Keivan Davami, a postdoctoral scholar, and Prashant Purohit, an associate professor of mechanical engineering. Bargatin lab members John Cortes and Chen Lin, both graduate students; Lin Zhao, a former student in Engineering’s nanotechnology master’s program; and Eric Lu and Drew Lilley, undergraduate students in the Vagelos Integrated Program in Energy Research, also contributed to the research.

They published their findings in the journal Nature Communications.

“Materials on the nanoscale are often much stronger than you’d expect, but they can be hard to use on the macroscale” Bargatin said. “We’ve essentially created a freestanding plate that has nanoscale thickness but is big enough to be handled by hand. That hasn’t been done before.”

Graphene, which can be as thin as a single atom of carbon, has been the poster-child for ultra-thin materials since it’s discovery won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2010. Graphene is prized for its electrical properties, but its mechanical strength is also very appealing, especially if it could stand on its own. However, graphene and other atomically thin films typically need to be stretched like a canvas in a frame, or even mounted on a backing, to prevent them from curling or clumping up on their own.

“The problem is that frames are heavy, making it impossible to use the intrinsically low weight of these ultra-thin films,” Bargatin said. “Our idea was to use corrugation instead of a frame. That means the structures we make are no longer completely planar, instead, they have a three-dimensional shape that looks like a honeycomb, but they are flat and contiguous and completely freestanding.”

“It’s like an egg carton, but on the nanoscale,” said Purohit.

The researchers’ plates are between 25 and 100 nanometers thick and are made of aluminum oxide, which is deposited one atomic layer at a time to achieve precise control of thickness and their distinctive honeycomb shape.

“Aluminum oxide is actually a ceramic, so something that is ordinarily pretty brittle,” Bargatin said. “You would expect it, from daily experience, to crack very easily. But the plates bend, twist, deform and recover their shape in such a way that you would think they are made out of plastic. The first time we saw it, I could hardly believe it.”

Once finished, the plates’ corrugation provides enhanced stiffness. When held from one end, similarly thin films would readily bend or sag, while the honeycomb plates remain rigid. This guards against the common flaw in un-patterned thin films, where they curl up on themselves.

This ease of deformation is tied to another behavior that makes ultra-thin films hard to use outside controlled conditions: they have the tendency to conform to the shape of any surface and stick to it due to Van der Waals forces. Once stuck, they are hard to remove without damaging them.

Totally flat films are also particularly susceptible to tears or cracks, which can quickly propagate across the entire material.

“If a crack appears in our plates, however, it doesn’t go all the way through the structure,” Davami said. “It usually stops when it gets to one of the vertical walls of the corrugation.”

The corrugated pattern of the plates is an example of a relatively new field of research: mechanical metamaterials. Like their electromagnetic counterparts, mechanical metamaterials achieve otherwise impossible properties from the careful arrangement of nanoscale features. In mechanical metamaterials’ case, these properties are things like stiffness and strength, rather than their ability to manipulate electromagnetic waves.

Other existing examples of mechanical metamaterials include “nanotrusses,” which are exceptionally lightweight and robust three-dimensional scaffolds made out of nanoscale tubes. The Penn researchers’ plates take the concept of mechanical metamaterials a step further, using corrugation to achieve similar robustness in a plate form and without the holes found in lattice structures.

That combination of traits could be used to make wings for insect-inspired flying robots, or in other applications where the combination of ultra-low thickness and mechanical robustness is critical.

“The wings of insects are a few microns thick, and can’t thinner because they’re made of cells,” Bargatin said. “The thinnest man-made wing material I know of is made by depositing a Mylar film on a frame, and it’s about half a micron thick. Our plates can be ten or more times thinner than that, and don’t need a frame at all. As a result, they weigh as little as than a tenth of a gram per square meter.”

SITRI, a center for accelerating the development and commercialization of “More than Moore” solutions to power the Internet of Things, and Bosch China—through its subsidiary Bosch (China) Investment Ltd.—a global supplier of technology and services, announced today they have signed an agreement to collaborate on the study, development and promotion of solutions and applications for the rapidly growing IoT (Internet of Things) space. The agreement covers IoT applications such as smart home, wearable devices, smart city, Industry 4.0 and robotics.

The agreement facilitates the development of new paths to market for products destined for the rapidly growing China IoT market, for which some analysts have forecasted a CAGR of over 30 percent between now and 2019. It also opens the door to the possible future development of joint demonstration facilities to speed the commercialization ofIoT technologies and products.

“Innovation and applications in the IoT space are developing rapidly,especially in China,” said Dr. Charles Yang, President of SITRI. “Bringing together Bosch’s global technology leadership with SITRI’s unique platform for rapid incubation and commercialization of new IoT technologies will enable a fast start on designs that can be commercialized quickly forthis fast moving market.”

SITRI is emerging as the center for “More than Moore” commercialization and industry development, providing 360-degree solutions for companies and startups pursuing these new technologies, including investment, design, simulation, market engagement and company growth support. SITRI is associated with the Shanghai Institute of Microsystem and Information Technology (SIMIT) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and has established strong ties to a broad range of Chinese industry, research and university players. This ecosystem enables these new businesses to grow by quickly taking their innovations from concept to commercialization.

What is true for double-blade razors is also true for solar cells: two work steps are more thorough than one. Stacking two solar cells one on top of the other, where top cell is semi-transparent, which efficiently converts large energy photons into electricity, while the bottom cell converts the remaining or transmitted low energy photons in an optimum manner. This allows a larger portion of the light energy to be converted to electricity. Up to now, the sophisticated technology needed for the procedure was mainly confined to the realm of Space or Concentrated Photovoltaics (CPV). These “tandem cells” grown on very expensive single crystal wafers are considered not attractive for mass production and low cost solar electricity. The research team working under Stephan Buecheler and Ayodhya N. Tiwari from the Laboratory for Thin Films and Photovoltaics at Empa-Swiss Federal Laboratories for Material Science and Technology has now succeeded in making tandem solar cells that are based on polycrystalline thin films, and the methods are suitable for large area low cost processing, Flexible plastic or metal foils could also be used as substrate in future. This marks a major milestone on the path to mass production of high-efficiency solar cells with low cost processes.

The secret behind the new process is that the researchers create the top solar cell perovskite film with a low-temperature procedure at just 50 degrees Celsius. This promises an energy-saving and cost-saving production stage for future manufacturing processes. The tandem solar cell yielded an efficiency rate of 20.5% when converting light to electricity. Already with this first attempt Empa researchers have emphasized that it has lots more potential to offer for better conversion of solar spectrum into electricity.

The semi-transparent perovskite solar cell absorbs UV, blue and yellow visible light. It allows red light and infrared radiation to pass through. Based on this principle, a double-layer "tandem solar cell" can be built with an efficiency that is much higher than single-layer solar cells. Credit: Empa

The semi-transparent perovskite solar cell absorbs UV, blue and yellow visible light. It allows red light and infrared radiation to pass through. Based on this principle, a double-layer “tandem solar cell” can be built with an efficiency that is much higher than single-layer solar cells. Credit: Empa

Molecular soccer balls as a substrate for the magic crystal

The key to this double success was the development of a 14.2% efficient semi-transparent solar cell, with 72% average transparency, made from methylammonium lead iodide deposited in the form of tiny perovskite crystals. The perovskite is grown on a thin interlayer made of the substance abbreviated as PCBM (phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester) is used . Each PCBM molecule contains 61 carbon atoms interconnected in the shape of a soccer ball. The perovskite film is prepared by a combination of vapour deposition and spin coating onto this layer, which has tiny football like structure, followed by an annealing at a “lukewarm” temperature. This magic perovskite crystal absorbs blue and yellow spectrum of visible light and converts these into electricity. By contrast, red light and infrared radiation simply pass through the crystal. As a result, the researchers can attach a further solar cell underneath the semi-transparent perovskite cell in order to convert the remaining light into electricity.

Advantage of the double-layer cell: better use of the spectrum of sunlight

For the lower layer of the tandem solar cell, the Empa researchers use a CIGS cell (copper indium gallium diselenide), a technique that the team has been researching for years. Based on the CIGS cells, small-scale production is already under way for flexible solar cells. The advantage of tandem solar cells is that they exploit sunlight better. A solar cell can only convert radiation with an energy level higher than the bandgap of the semiconductor used. If the radiation energy is lower, no electricity is generated. If the radiation is higher in energy, the excess radiated energy is converted to heat and is lost. A double-layer solar cell like Empa’s perovskite CIGS cell can combine substances with differing bandgaps and thus efficiently convert a larger share of the incident solar energy to electricity.

More than 30% efficiency is possible

While very good single-layer polycrystalline solar cell may practically convert a maximum of 25% of the solar energy to electricity, tandem solar cells could increase this figure to beyond 30%. That’s according to Ayodhya Tiwari, head of the Thin Film and Photovoltaics laboratory. He does say, however, that a lot of research work is needed before that will be possible. “What we have achieved now is just the beginning. We will have to overcome many obstacles before reaching this ambitious goal. To do this, we will need lots of interdisciplinary experience and a large number of combinatorial experiments until we have found a semi-transparent high-performance cell together with the right base cell, and technologies for electrical interconnections of these solar cells.”

Stephan Bücheler, who coordinates the lab research in Tiwari’s team, reminds us that the race for efficiency in solar cell research is certainly not just an academic show. “When producing solar-powered electricity, only half of the costs are down to the solar module itself. The other half are incurred for the infrastructure: inverters, cables, carriers for the cells, engineering costs and installation. These ancillary costs are reduced when the solar cells become more efficient and can be built in smaller sizes as a result. This means that efficient solar cells are the key to low-cost renewable electricity.”

Silicon Labs has announced the acquisition of Telegesis, a supplier of wireless mesh networking modules based on Silicon Labs’ ZigBee technology. A privately held company founded in 1998 and based near London, Telegesis has established itself as a ZigBee expert with strong momentum in the smart energy market, providing ZigBee module solutions to many of the world’s top smart metering manufacturers.

In its official release, Silicon Labs said this strategic acquisition accelerates Silicon Labs’ roadmap for ZigBee and Thread-ready modules and enhances the company’s ability to support customer needs with comprehensive mesh networking solutions ranging from wireless system-on-chip (SoC) devices to plug-and-play modules backed by best-in-class 802.15.4 software stacks and development tools. Telegesis modules integrate the antenna and provide a pre-certified RF design that reduces certification costs, compliance efforts and time to market. Customers can migrate later from modules to cost-efficient SoC-based designs with minimal system redesign and full software reuse.

The market for ZigBee modules is large and growing. According to IHS Technology, 20 percent of all ZigBee PRO integrated circuits shipping today are used in modules, and ZigBee module shipments are expected to grow at a compounded rate of 24.6 percent between now and 2019.

Telegesis exclusively uses Silicon Labs’ ZigBee technology in its module products, which are deployed in smart meters, USB adapters and gateways for smart energy applications. Additional target applications include home automation, connected lighting, security and industrial automation. The modules come with Silicon Labs’ rigorously tested, field-proven EmberZNet PRO ZigBee protocol stack, which sets the bar for ZigBee stack reliability and has been deployed in more connected products than any other ZigBee PRO stack. Telegesis also offers comprehensive development and evaluation kits to help developers streamline their ZigBee-based applications.

“The addition of Telegesis’s successful module business strengthens Silicon Labs’ position as the market leader in mesh networking solutions for the Internet of Things,” said James Stansberry, senior vice president and general manager of Silicon Labs’ IoT products. “The combination of Telegesis modules, Silicon Labs mesh networking SoCs, best-in-class 802.15.4 software stacks and easy-to-use wireless development tools provides customers with a seamless migration path from modules to SoCs and from ZigBee to Thread-based networks.”

“The Telegesis team is truly excited to become an integral part of Silicon Labs,” said Ollie Smith, director of business development at Telegesis. “Together, our hardware and software engineering teams will drive innovation in wireless mesh networking while giving customers a flexible choice of module and SoC-based designs leveraging both ZigBee and Thread technology.”

The MEMS industry today is in the age of sensing and interacting. The wide diffusion of MEMS and sensors gives us a better, safer perception of the external environment. In its latest report, Status of the MEMS Industry (Yole Développement, May 2015), the “More than Moore” market research and strategy consulting company, Yole Développement (Yole) estimates that 14 billion devices were produced in 2015. Almost 30 billion will be made annually by 2020. For inertial MEMS devices, Yole’s analysts highlight that IMU manufacturing volumes will grow about 23% between 2015 and 2020. Gyroscope and accelerometer production volumes are also growing, with the following CAGR: 7.9% and 1.6% respectively over the same period. Every sector will keep growing. So, what’s next?

The French Inertial MEMS community, including Yole, will gather on November 27 in Saclay, France. There they will discuss technological evolution and the latest market trends, identify business opportunities and share visions of the future. The conference, entitled “4ème Journée Micro & Nano Technologies pour l’Inertiel,” is backed by the Club des Micro & Nanotechnologies. The Organizing Committee has arranged 19 presentations and is expecting about 100 attendees.

“This event showcases the strength of our national ecosystem in the strategic inertial MEMS area, which covers a wide range of applications, from consumer to automotive, including civil aerospace and military,” said Stéphane Renard, President of the Club NanoMicroTechnologie and Chief Technology Officer at Tronics Microsystems. “Based on this packed program, I am convinced this event will be a huge opportunity for fruitful discussions and exchanges.”

Yole has been actively following the inertial MEMS market’s evolution for more than 17 years. Yole’s analysts conduct thousands of direct interviews in this area every year, with device and system manufacturers, designers, equipment and materials suppliers, and technology developers.

“Most of the discussions we have with the key players in this industry highlight the progressive introduction of more degrees of freedom,” said Dr. Eric Mounier, Senior Technology & Market Analyst, MEMS & Sensors at Yole. “2014 was a successful year for consumer IMU sensors. At Yole, we see high volume adoption in platforms such as the Apple iPhone 6s PlusTM. Clearly, the 6-axis IMU has been adopted in a growing number of platforms. In parallel, 9-axis solutions are gradually being proposed by MEMS device manufacturers with a major target: the wearable market.”

In its MEMS technology and market analysis, Yole estimates that the IMU market was worth US$966 million in 2014, and will grow to US$3 billion in 2020. Consumer smartphones and tablets are driving IMU development. However, business opportunities remain for discrete sensors including accelerometers and gyroscopes for camera module stabilization.

The conference welcomes presentations from leaders of the inertial industry: Thales, iXBlue, Sagem, Club Nano, Dolphin Integration, Asygn, l’Onera, IES Université de Montpellier, Airbus DS, la Direction Générale des Armées (DGA) and more are part of the “4ème Journée Micro & Nano Technologies pour l’Inertiel” program.

There have been a lot of important announcements made by inertial MEMS manufacturers this year that illustrate progress in market volumes and innovations. Some of them will present their vision and highlight the technical evolution during the conference.

For example, Colibrys has recently released its dedicated accelerometer targeting crucial up-and-coming industrial applications, described in an interview available on i-micronews.com. It will be part of the “Perspectives & Applications session” and will share its expertise with the conference’s attendees.

The Executive & Marketing team from Tronics, another major player of the inertial MEMS market, will present progress made on its high performance standard product range GYPRO & AXO. It will also discuss the latest technologies and improvements for future applications, including the M&NEMS platform, developed in collaboration with LETI and dedicated to consumer and automotive applications.

By 2020, the inertial MEMS device market landscape should look very different.

“The next opportunity should come from wearable electronics, where long-term market potential is huge, and autonomous driving,” explained Dr. Guillaume Girardin, Technology & Market Analyst, MEMS & Sensors at Yole.

As part of the third level in assisted driving, the dead reckoning function could be a valuable market opportunity for the inertial MEMS community. This function includes inertial sensors for relative motion associated with cars, such as wheel odometers, encoders, accelerometers and gyroscopes. In the new report “Sensors & Data Management for Autonomous Vehicles” (Yole Développement, October 2015), Yole draws a detailed sensor technology roadmap and describes the associated autonomous functions that will be relevant from 2012 to 2040 and beyond. This covers the numerous sensors and related technologies that could be embedded in vehicles for assisted and autonomous driving.

By Sue Davis, Director of Business Development & Senior Analyst, Techcet

IDTechEx Printed Electronics USA 2015, held in Santa Clara, CA Nov 18-19, is one mega conference with 8 co-located tracks ranging from sensor technology & wearables to IoT, energy harvesting & storage to electric vehicles, 3D printing and graphene. IDTechEx completely occupied the Santa Clara Convention Center; throughout the day attendees and exhibitors commented attendance was up over prior years. To the dismay of some late arrivals, parking spaces were at a premium.

A venue with >200 exhibitors showcasing new technologies and applications connected conference attendees with equipment and materials suppliers, OEMs, end users, research institutes and academia.

Raghu Das, CEO of IDTechEx, kicked off the conference by sharing a key trends including:

  • Structural electronics are here now!
  • The Fashion industry is converging with technology (and evidenced by a number of exhibitors from this sector)
  • Stretchable electronics R&D has ramped significantly in the last 12 months
  • Printed and flexible electronics manufacturing is becoming center stage

Dr. Mounir Zok, a keynote speaker and biomedical engineering specialist for the US Olympic committee started his talk with a quote “The blink of an eye dictates gold vs no medal.” He emphasized that technology is a key enabler to continually improve sports performance.

Highlights from exhibitors and speakers follow.

Keith McMillen, founder and CEO of BeBop Sensors and avid musician, shared his journey of developing smart fabric cylindrical sensors to analyze a violinist’s bow movement led to utilizing this technology for the Internet of Things and the founding of BeBop Sensors.

BeBop Sensor Examples

BeBop Sensor Examples

Dream car in every facet; aesthetics, functionality and environmental impact understates the design of the Blade Car. Keith Czinger, CEO and Founder of Divergent discussed the foundation for Blade’s development was deeply rooted in reducing environmental impact while ensuring high performance. Divergent reports that manual chassis assembly can be completed within 30 minutes utilizing its’ node network. Nodes are manufactured of a metal alloy and produced using 3D printers. The light and strong chassis is comprised of these nodes and with carbon fiber tubes.

Divergent Blade utilizing 3D printing for node-tube chassis

Divergent Blade utilizing 3D printing for node-tube chassis

Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) manufactured via additive 3D printing technology, vs. conventional processing labor, material and time intensive processes was demonstrated at NanoDimension’s booth. Simon Fried, CMO and Co-Founder of NanoDimension discussed the benefit of 3D printed circuit boards (prototyping in hours vs weeks, design flexibility, process repeatability, …). In addition to development the DragonFly 3D printer, NanoDimension has developed a line of specialty conductive inks.

NanoDimension DragonFly 200 3D Printer

NanoDimension DragonFly 200 3D Printer

Sensoria Fitness has developed a line of wear fitness clothing and integrated running system that communicates with iOS and Android apps. A key use case is the gait analysis capability to assist with performance running and to assist clinicians with treatment plans for dysfunctional gait patterns.

Sensoria Fitness Socks (Innovation Awards at CES 2015 & IDTechEx 2015 USA)

Sensoria Fitness Socks (Innovation Awards at CES 2015 & IDTechEx 2015 USA)

View Technologies, a joint venture between Stanley Black & Decker, Inc. and RF Controls, has developed the inView Platform that enables 3rd party applications to run more efficiently and accurately. This platform is comprised of Echo antenna(s) and three tiers of service that allow you Locate, Track and Act depending on business needs. Location service provide as real-time stream of 3D position data for Passive UHF RFID tags.

View Technologies - Manufacturing Application

View Technologies – Manufacturing Application

Valencell develops high-performance biometric sensor technology and licenses its technology to a variety of consumer electronics manufacturers, mobile device and accessory makers, sports and fitness brands, gaming companies, and first-responder/military suppliers for integration into their products.

Products utilizing Valencell’s Biometric Sensor Technolgy

Products utilizing Valencell’s Biometric Sensor Technolgy

Another show highlight was Demonstration Street, a dedicated area on the show floor for product demonstrations in various stages of development – prototype to commercialization- featured printed flexible displays including posters, e-readers, audio paper, interactive games, OLED displays, electronics in fabrics, interactive printed controls and menus, printed RFID and more.

IDTechEx 2015 USA offered a myriad of opportunities to interact with technologists and exhibitors attend hundreds of insightful presentations. Master classes covering an array of topics and company tours bookended the two-day conference and exhibition. The main challenge was to create a “show plan” in hopes that one would be able to attend desired presentations and exhibits.

By Sue Davis, Director of Business Development & Senior Analyst, Techcet

IDTechEx Printed Electronics USA 2015, held in Santa Clara, CA Nov 18-19, is one mega conference with 8 co-located tracks ranging from sensor technology & wearables to IoT, energy harvesting & storage to electric vehicles, 3D printing and graphene. IDTechEx completely occupied the Santa Clara Convention Center; throughout the day attendees and exhibitors commented the attendance was indeed up over prior years. To the dismay of some late arrivals, parking spaces were at a premium.

A venue with >200 exhibitors showcasing new technologies and applications connected conference attendees with equipment and materials suppliers, OEMs, end users, research institutes and academia.

Raghu Das, CEO of IDTechEx, kicked off the conference by sharing a key trends including:

  • Structural electronics are here now!
  • The Fashion industry is converging with technology (and evidenced by a number of exhibitors from this sector)
  • Stretchable electronics R&D has ramped significantly in the last 12 months
  • Printed and flexible electronics manufacturing is becoming center stage

Dr. Mounir Zok, a keynote speaker and biomedical engineering specialist for the US Olympic committee started his talk with a quote: “The blink of an eye dictates gold vs no medal.” He emphasized that technology is a key enabler to continually improve sports performance.

I had the opportunity to meet with several exhibitors:

  • Keith McMillen, founder and CEO of BeBop Sensors and avid musician, shared his journey of developing cylindrical sensors to analyze a violinist’s bow movement led to utilizing this technology for the Internet of Things and the founding of BeBop Sensors. Smart fabric is the core for Bebop’s sensor platform.
  • Dream car in every facet; aesthetics, functionality and environment understates the design of the Blade Keith Czinger, CEO and Founder of Divergent, discussed the foundation for Blade’s development was deeply rooted in reducing environmental impact while ensuring high performance.
  • Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) – manufactured via additive 3D printing technology vs. conventional processing labor, material and time intensive processes was demonstrated at NanoDimesion’s booth. Simon Fried, CMO and Co-Founder of NanoDimension discussed the benefit of 3D printed circuit boards (prototyping in hours vs weeks, design flexibility, process repeatability, …). In addition to development the 3D printers, NanoDimension has developed a line of specialty inks.

Another show highlight was Demonstration Street, a dedicated area on the show floor for product demonstrations in various stages of development – prototype to commercialization- featured printed flexible displays including posters, e-readers, audio paper, interactive games, OLED displays, electronics in fabrics, interactive printed controls and menus, printed RFID and more.

Stay tuned: Day 2 promises to be equally exciting! The main challenge is navigating IDTechEx to see all the great technology.

BY PETER CONNOCK, Chairman of memsstar

The dramatic shift from the trend for increasingly advanced technology to a vast array and volume of application-based devices presents Europe with a huge opportunity. Europe is a world leader in several major market segments – think automotive and healthcare as two examples – and many more are developing and growing at a rapid rate. Europe has the technology and manufacturing skills to satisfy these new markets but they must be addressed cost effectively – and that’s where the use of secondary equipment and related services comes in.

While Moore’s Law continues to drive the production of advanced devices, the broadening of the “More than Moore” market is poised to explode. All indicators are pointing to a major expansion in applications to support a massive increase in data interchange through sensors and related devices. The devices used to support these applications will range from simple sensors to complex packages but most can, and will, be built by “lower” technology level manufacturing equipment.

This equipment will, in many cases, be required to be “remanufactured” and “repurposed” but will allow semiconductor suppliers to extend the use of their depreciated equipment and/or bring in additional equipment, matched to their process needs, at reduced cost. In many cases this older equipment will need to be supported by advanced manufacturing control techniques and new test and packaging capabilities.

SEMI market research shows that investment in “legacy” fabs is important in manufacturing semiconductor products, including the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) class of devices and sensors, and remains a sizeable portion of the industries manufacturing base:

  • 150mm and 200mm fab capacity represent approximately 40 percent of the total installed fab capacity
  • 200mm fab capacity is on the rise, led by foundries that are increasing 200mm capacity by about 7 percent through to 2016 compared to 2012 levels
  • New applications related to mobility, sensing, and IoT are expected to provide opportunities for manufacturers with 200mm fabs

Out of the total US$ 27 billion spent in 2013 on fab equipment and US$ 31 billion spent on fab equipment in 2014, secondary fab equipment represents approximately 5 percent of the total, or US$ 1.5 billion, annually, according to SEMI’s 2015 secondary fab equipment market report. For 2014, 200mm fab investments by leading foundries and IDMs resulted in a 45 percent increase in spending for secondary 200mm equipment.

Secondary equipment will form at least part of the strategy of almost anyone manufacturing or developing semiconductors in Europe. In many cases, it is an essential capability for competitive production. As the secondary equipment industry increases its strategic importance to semiconductor manufac- turers and researchers it is critical that the corresponding supply chain ensures a supply of quality equipment, support and services to meet rapidly developing consumer needs.

Common challenges across the supply chain include:

  • How to generate cooperation across Europe between secondary equipment users and suppliers and what sort of cooperation is needed?
  • How to ensure the availability of sufficient engineering resource to support the European secondary installed base?
  • Are there shortages of donor systems or critical compo- nents that are restricting the use of secondary equipment and, if so, how might this be resolved

Europe’s secondary industry will be in the spotlight during two sessions at SEMICON Europa 2015:

  • Secondary Equipment Session – Enabling the Internet of “Everything”?
  • SEA Europe ‘Round Table’ Meeting

The sessions are organised by the SEMI SEA Europe Group and are open to everyone associated with the secondary industry, be they device manufacturer or supplier, interested in the development of a vibrant industry providing critical support to cost effective manufacturing in Europe.

Graphene is the first truly two-dimensional crystal, which was obtained experimentally and investigated regarding its unique chemical and physical properties. In 2010, two MIPT alumni, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics “for ground-breaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional material graphene.” There has now been a considerable increase in the number of research studies aimed at finding commercial applications for graphene and other two-dimensional materials. One of the most promising applications for graphene is thought to be biomedical technologies, which is what researchers from the Laboratory of Nanooptics and Plasmonics at the MIPT’s Center of Excellence for Nanoscale Optoelectronics are currently investigating.

Label-free biosensors are relatively new in biochemical and pharmaceutical laboratories, and have made work much easier. The sensors enable researchers to detect low concentrations of biologically significant molecular substances (RNA, DNA, proteins, including antibodies and antigens, viruses and bacteria) and study their chemical properties. Unlike other biochemical methods, fluorescent or radioactive labels are not needed for these biosensors, which makes it easier to conduct an experiment, and also reduces the likelihood of erroneous data due to the effects that labels have on biochemical reactions. The main applications of this technology are in pharmaceutical and scientific research, medical diagnostics, food quality control and the detection of toxins. Label-free biosensors have already proven themselves as a method of obtaining the most reliable data on pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of drugs in pre-clinical studies. The advantages of this method are explained by the fact that the kinetics of the biochemical reactions of the ligand (active substance) with different targets can be observed in real time, which allows researchers to obtain more accurate data about the reaction rates, which was not previously possible. The data obtained gives information about the efficacy of a drug and also its toxicity, if the targets are “healthy” cells or their parts, which the drug, ideally, should not affect.

This is a schematic cross-sectional view of the graphene biosensor chip from US Patent Application No. 2015/0301039 (Oct 2015). Credit: MIPT

Most label-free biosensors are based on the use of surface plasmon resonance (SPR) spectroscopy. The “resonance” parameters depend on the surface properties to such an extent that even trace amounts of “foreign” substances can significantly affect them. Biosensors are able to detect a trillionth of a gram of a detectable substance in an area of one square millimetre.

Commercial devices of this type are sold in a format similar to “razor blade” business model, which includes an instrument and highly expensive consumables. The instrument is the biosensor itself, comprising optics, microfluidics and electronics. The consumables for biosensors are sensor chips comprised of a glass substrate, thin gold film and a linking layer for the adsorption of biomolecules. Sensor chips currently use two types of linking layer technology that were developed more than 20 years ago and are based either on a layer of self-assembled thiol molecules, or a layer of hydrogel (usually carboxymethyl dextran). The profit that companies have received from the sale of biosensors and consumables is evenly distributed at a ratio of 50:50.

The authors of the patent, Aleksey Arsenin and Yury Stebunov, are proposing an alternative to existing sensor chips for biosensors based on surface plasmon resonance. Under certain conditions, the use of graphene or graphene oxide as a linking layer between metal film and a biological layer comprised of molecule targets is able to significantly improve the sensitivity of biodetection. The graphene sensor chips were tested on Biacore T200 (General Electric Company) and BiOptix 104sa biosensors.

The use of graphene oxide sensor chips to analyse DNA hybridization reactions is described in detail in a recent paper by the authors in the American Chemical Society’s journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces. In addition to a higher level of sensitivity than similar commercial products, the proposed sensor chips possess the required property of biospecificity and can be used multiple times, which greatly reduces the costs of conducting biochemical studies using the chips.

The use of graphene increases the sensitivity of analyses conducted using SPR spectroscopy more than ten times, which will revolutionize the field of pharmaceutical biodetection. The application of biosensors is currently limited to analysing biological products based on large molecules, whilst more than half of the drugs produced each year have a low molecular weight (no more than a few hundred Daltons). Immobilization of drug targets on the surface of a graphene chip will enable scientists to test the interaction between targets and small molecules. An example of this could be the development of drugs that act on receptors coupled with G-proteins (GPCRs), which are currently the targets for 40% of drugs on the market. Pharmaceutical studies of drugs acting on GPCRs are not currently conducted using SPR due to the insufficient sensitivity of the method. It is therefore expected that the use of graphene biosensors in pharmaceutical studies will help to accelerate the development of drugs and overcome dangerous diseases that cannot be treated with the drugs currently on the pharmaceutical market.

The authors are continuing to work to improve their development and expect that for certain reactions, biosensor chips based on the new carbon materials will provide a level of sensitivity that is dozens or hundreds of times higher than similar commercial products currently on the market. They are also considering the possibility of commercializing graphene chips. In 2014 alone, approximately 10 billion US dollars were spent on pre-clinical studies. According to estimates, the annual market for biosensor chips is worth a total of approximately 300 million US dollars. The excellent properties of graphene biosensor chips will enable them to compete strongly with existing types of chips – up to one third of the entire market.