Body heat to power future medical wearables

It has been learnt that a few researchers have claimed to develop a new way to harvest body heat and turn it into electricity to power medical wearables.

According to TechCrunch, the team of NC State researchers have developed a patch that is roughly a centimetre squared, that would firmly attach to a person’s bicep.

The small device would then be able to generate energy up to 20 Microwatts, a lot compared to previous technologies. Though it cannot generate enough energy to power a smartwatch, it is capable of powering smaller equipments such as medical sensors.

The patch creates electricity by using the difference in temperature between a individuals body an the surrounding air. The excess heat is first pushed through the wearable thermoelectric generator, which is just two millimetres thick.

The team also claims to have developed another version of the gadget that would integrate into a t-shirt, however, it is not capable of drawing as much power as the bicep patch.

If this hardware succeeds in generating power using such mechanisms, the need for bulky power cells used in medical equipment can be eliminated.