Summary

This 60 minute Flexinar, presented by Dr. Azar Alizadeh of GE Global Research, will provide an overview of several approaches to the microfluidics of perspiration and the benefits and limitations of each using hydration measurement as the application example.

There exists a multitude of approaches for transporting perspiration non-invasively to a sensor which can characterize the biomarkers in the fluid to understand questions about hydration, cognition, fatigue, or a variety of other applications. GE has worked with several partners to develop approaches tailored to analyzing dehydration in laborers, warfighters, and athletes. In this example, laboratory gold standards for hydration assessment are based on total body water and plasma osmolality under controlled conditions of stable and equilibrated body fluids. In practice, body mass losses are used as an indirect measure of fluid content, but continuous assessment of an individual’s body mass fluctuations in the field during a mission is unrealistic. In order to develop a representative understanding of whole-body hydration in the field, multiple signals may need to be combined in order to get accurate understanding of the status of the subject.

Presenter

NextFlex Fellow Dr. Azar Alizadeh is a senior material scientist at GE Global Research where she develops materials and processes for applications such as health-monitoring sensors, non-icing surfaces, nano-enabled media storage, and optoelectronic devices. She holds a PhD in physics and has extensive experience in the field of nano-bio-manufacturing and has led numerous cross-functional teams during her tenure at GE Global Research, including the NBMC “Wearable device for dynamic assessment of hydration status;” the US Army “A wearable physiological monitoring system for assessment of hemodynamic state;” and the AFRL study of “Sensor systems for warfighter health and performance monitoring and augmentation.” She also serves as a co-lead on the NextFlex Human Health Monitoring Systems Technical Working Group. Dr. Alizadeh has 45 peer reviewed publications and 13 US patents/patent applications.

When

Wednesday, September 6, 2017
10:00-11:00 AM Pacific (1:00-2:00 PM Eastern)