MIT researchers developed a system that wirelessly feeds machines embedded in the body

Wire wirelessly to electronic equipmentWireless power transmissionThe system is put to practical use in devices such as smartphones. Researchers at MIT developed this system to wirelessly supply power to machines embedded in animals' bodies.

Wireless system can power devices inside the body | MIT News
http://news.mit.edu/2018/wireless-system-power-devices-inside-body-0604

Conventionally, devices such as pacemakers that are embedded and driven inside the body had to have a battery with a certain lifetime on the device itself. A battery with capacity to move the equipment for a while is sometimes big enough to occupy the majority of the equipment, which seems to have been a big barrier to downsizing the equipment embedded in the body.

MIT'sFadel AbibAssociate Professor 's research team developed a system that feeds high frequency waves that can pass through the body safely for devices embedded in the body. The research team has already succeeded in supplying electricity at high frequencies emitted from a distance of 1 m from the skin to equipment implanted at a depth of 10 cm from pig skin in animal experiments using pigs . Also, when the implanted device was installed near the surface of the skin, it was able to supply electricity even from a distance of 38 m indeed.

Embedded devices that can be wirelessly powered from outside the body do not require huge batteries, so they can be made smaller than the devices that have been used so far. In this animal experiment we used devices as large as rice grains, but researchers have said that they can be further miniaturized.

In the past, the technology of wirelessly supplying power to equipment embedded in the body had a problem of radio waves dissipating when radio waves passed through the body, and it was difficult to secure the power necessary for powering embedded devices It was. In order to overcome this problem, the research team developed a technology called In Vivo Networking (IVN). In the IVN system, by arranging antennas radiating radio waves of slightly different frequencies, as a radio wave advances, a plurality of shifted frequencies overlap each other, and when a plurality of frequencies overlap each other within a certain range to produce a large radio wave Thing.


Medical devices of the type to be implanted in the body play the role of monitoring the condition of the body in real time, sending the necessary information to the doctor and communicating the medicine necessary for treatment to the right place. In the power supply method using the IVN system, it can also be used as a controller that sends electric signals to the embedded device at the same time as power is supplied and makes a specific operation.

Also, if the precision of transmitting electric power from outside the body to the appropriate part inside the body is improved, as a treatment for diseases such as Parkinson's disease, an electric or magnetic stimulus is sent to an appropriate part of the brainDeep brain stimulation therapyThe research team thinks that there is a possibility that it can be done without embedded equipment.

"In the stage when we arrived at this experiment, there is still a trade-off between the distance from the target and the depth embedded in the skin," Mr. Abibu said, and as it will further improve the wireless power supply system is. In addition, other than the field of medical equipmentRFIDI mentioned that the IVN system may be applicable to wireless communication using technology.