BASE: Bio-Implantable Arrayed Sensing Environment 

Motivation

The Bio-Implantable Arrayed Sensing Environment (BASE) addresses a fundamental problem in critical disease tracking: the lack of quick and actionable diagnostic feedback on applied therapies. Specifically, we seek to demonstrate continuous sensing of clinically-significant parameters like pH, bio-impedance, and temperature with high temporal resolution during the months-long timescale of cancer therapies (or other long-term diseases, like autoimmune disease). Moreover, we seek to have an underlying architecture capable of 'plug-n-play' for a variety of both 'simple' and complex sensors - such as INSITE and CLARITI.

Our Solution

Acting as an implantable hub deep within the body for sensor control, persistent data storage, and wireless power and data transfer via inductive coupling, our implant SoC, BASE-Hub, enables unprecedented long-term, asynchronous diagnostic sensing within disease sites through the following innovations:

• 1)  > 5 cm implantation depth with a mm-scale implant – Using a novel mm-scale battery approaches and a wireless link 5-10+ cm into tissue, a minimally-invasive, implantable form factor is retained.

• 2)  A “plug and play” interface for multiplexed sensing – BASE-Hub’s finite state machine “turns on” standalone, on-implant companion sensor ICs and digitizes / deserializes their analog / serial digital outputs for storage on chip and on-demand upload. This interface significantly reduces the integration design burden for creators of sensor frontends and will allow healthcare providers to track multiple parameters within the implantation site for the first time.

In the near future, we aim to bring up BASE-Hub together with BASE-Link, the wireless power and data transfer setup that will showcase BASE-Hub's dual capabilities to extend implantation depth and enable chronic, multiplexed sensing. We then look forward to optimizing BASE for preclinical use.