Design Article
Toward pacemakers powered by heartbeats
10/17/2012 8:24 AM EDT
Power management ICs
HBS's whole conversion chain is presented in figure 8. A power converter and a buffer are inserted between the energy harvester and the device to supply. In order to respect the size constraints, the buffer and the power converter are integrated circuits and designed by Easii IC.
In both cases, the power converter (figure 9) is a buck converter (step-down) which enables to get the best of the energy harvester by optimizing power extraction. A supercapacitor (buffer) stores the energy and supplies the electronic circuit, aimed at measuring heartbeats and delivering the adequate amount of energy at the right moment, with a constant voltage of 3V.
Thanks to this conversion chain and power consumption optimizations of the electronic circuits, heartbeats energy harvesting will be enough to generate pulses up to 3-4 Hz.
5. Conclusions and perspectives
HBS project has begun in 2010 and fully functional prototypes should be manufactured by the end of the year. The industrialization is expected within five to ten years, after validation tests and agreements from health administrations.
HBS project is a further step towards autonomous medical implants and could be applied to many devices such as cochlear implants, insulin pumps, glucose sensors…
6. Acknowledgements
This project is supported by Sorin and labeled by Minalogic. The authors would like to thank their partners and coworkers for their contribution to this article, and especially, S. Basrour and M. Colin (TIMA), A. Makdissi (Sorin), B. Challiol and J.P. Goglio (Easii IC), J.S. Danel, A.B. Duret, G. Despesse and T. Hilt (CEA-LETI).
7. References
[1] The 11th world survey of cardiac pacing and implantable cardioverter-defibrillators: calendar year 2009--a World Society of Arrhythmia's project, H.G. Mond, A. Proclemer, Pacing Clin Electrophysiol. 34(8):1013-27, 2011.
[2] Cardiac Pacemakers Market – Global Industry Size, Share, Trends, Analysis And Forecasts 2012-2018, Laurier Global Citizenship Conference, 2012
[3] Energy Harvesting System for Cardiac Implant Applications, M Deterre, B. Boutaud, R. Dalmolin, S. Boisseau, J.J. Chaillout, E. Lefeuvre, E. Dufour-Gergam, Proc. DTIP, 2011.
[4] Energy harvesting, wireless sensor networks & opportunities for industrial applications, S. Boisseau, G. Despesse, EETimes, 2012.
[5] Vibration energy harvesting for wireless sensor networks: Assessments and perspectives, S. Boisseau, G. Despesse, EETimes, 2012.
HBS's whole conversion chain is presented in figure 8. A power converter and a buffer are inserted between the energy harvester and the device to supply. In order to respect the size constraints, the buffer and the power converter are integrated circuits and designed by Easii IC.
Figure 8: Power conversion chain for HBS energy harvesters
In both cases, the power converter (figure 9) is a buck converter (step-down) which enables to get the best of the energy harvester by optimizing power extraction. A supercapacitor (buffer) stores the energy and supplies the electronic circuit, aimed at measuring heartbeats and delivering the adequate amount of energy at the right moment, with a constant voltage of 3V.
Figure 9: Buck converter developed by Easii IC
Thanks to this conversion chain and power consumption optimizations of the electronic circuits, heartbeats energy harvesting will be enough to generate pulses up to 3-4 Hz.
5. Conclusions and perspectives
HBS project has begun in 2010 and fully functional prototypes should be manufactured by the end of the year. The industrialization is expected within five to ten years, after validation tests and agreements from health administrations.
HBS project is a further step towards autonomous medical implants and could be applied to many devices such as cochlear implants, insulin pumps, glucose sensors…
6. Acknowledgements
This project is supported by Sorin and labeled by Minalogic. The authors would like to thank their partners and coworkers for their contribution to this article, and especially, S. Basrour and M. Colin (TIMA), A. Makdissi (Sorin), B. Challiol and J.P. Goglio (Easii IC), J.S. Danel, A.B. Duret, G. Despesse and T. Hilt (CEA-LETI).
7. References
[1] The 11th world survey of cardiac pacing and implantable cardioverter-defibrillators: calendar year 2009--a World Society of Arrhythmia's project, H.G. Mond, A. Proclemer, Pacing Clin Electrophysiol. 34(8):1013-27, 2011.
[2] Cardiac Pacemakers Market – Global Industry Size, Share, Trends, Analysis And Forecasts 2012-2018, Laurier Global Citizenship Conference, 2012
[3] Energy Harvesting System for Cardiac Implant Applications, M Deterre, B. Boutaud, R. Dalmolin, S. Boisseau, J.J. Chaillout, E. Lefeuvre, E. Dufour-Gergam, Proc. DTIP, 2011.
[4] Energy harvesting, wireless sensor networks & opportunities for industrial applications, S. Boisseau, G. Despesse, EETimes, 2012.
[5] Vibration energy harvesting for wireless sensor networks: Assessments and perspectives, S. Boisseau, G. Despesse, EETimes, 2012.
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seaEE
10/17/2012 11:25 PM EDT
This is probably as close to a perpetual motion machine as you can get! :)
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mjacoby
10/18/2012 12:30 PM EDT
One step closer to the Matrix!!
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agk
10/19/2012 8:40 AM EDT
Piezo and electrostatic principles are applied for energy harvesting. Piezo will be able to generate more power at least 10 times more than the electrostatic device.Also piezo will have more life time than the other one.
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Sebastien Boisseau
10/31/2012 6:33 AM EDT
FYI : more information on Electrostatic and electret-based energy harvesters : http://www.intechopen.com/books/small-scale-energy-harvesting/electrostatic-conversion-for-vibration-energy-harvesting
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green_is_now
4/28/2013 4:26 PM EDT
Thanks for the link Sabastien
two thoughts
dump the full bridge rectifier for two half bridges.
1) efficiency may double at these low voltages!
2) the common mode noise voltage created by a full bridge currupts the analog front end, getting worse with miniturization due to proximity of the power conversion
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