Wrist-band device for alcohol monitoring wins prize

SAN FRANCISCO — A San Francisco-based company has won a U.S. government-sponsored competition with an alcohol monitoring devices that can be worn on the wrist, the latest milestone in the development of wearable technologies that monitor and diagnose medical conditions.

BACtrack, a privately held medical device maker, took the $200,000 top prize in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Wearable Biosensor Challenge on Thursday with its wristband monitor, which measures blood alcohol levels via sweat on the skin.

The product, dubbed BACtrack Skyn, has not yet been submitted to the Food and Drug Administration for marketing approval.

Dr. George Koob, head of the NIH’s National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, said he expected the device to be a valuable resource for alcohol research community.

“It can help doctors accurately measure a patient’s drinking history, and not just depend on the most recent tests,” Koob said. “This can help a lot with the treatment.”

Medical, law enforcement and transportation officials have long sought better technology for detection of blood alcohol levels. Traditional portable breath alcohol testers (PBTs) are unwieldy and can cost over $1,000, and they don’t provide ongoing monitoring of alcohol levels.

“The blood alcohol monitoring devices used in legal and medical circles are big and bulky, like a ball and chain for the ones using it,” said Keith Nothacker, president of BACtrack. “We wanted to make something people would want to wear.”

The device in its current form will not, however, be a substitute for breathalyzers or blood tests used by law enforcement, because the device does not provide real-time blood-alcohol levels.

Nothacker said it takes about 45 minutes for ethanol to be transmitted through the skin, and that the device is designed to provide a recent history of alcohol use.

BACtrack has been experimenting with consumer-centric alcohol testing for several years. In 2013, it introduced the BACtrack Mobile Breathalyzer, which syncs with a smartphone to track blood alcohol content.

BACtrack beat seven other smaller companies to win the NIH competition. Milo, a Santa Barbara based technology startup, won the $100,000 second-place prize for its design of a wearable alcohol content tracker that also uses a skin sensor and communicates with a smartphone using wireless technology.

source: interaksyon.com

In Japan, happiness is… wearable sensors?

TOKYO, Japan — It is a problem that has defeated generations of philosophers, poets and painters, but one Japanese company thinks it has come up with a way of knowing for sure if people are happy.

Hitachi High Technologies, a subsidiary of ovens-to-trains conglomerate Hitachi, says its new happiness measuring device will let bosses know if they run a happy office — or if their employees are secretly bored at work.

The company has developed a credit-card size wearable device loaded with sensors that determine where the wearer is and whether he or she is sitting, standing, typing or nodding.

It also records who is talking to whom and for how long, among other activities.

The data is then sent back to a base unit, which calculates the happiness of the group as a whole by comparing the patterns of activity with pre-determined patterns from groups who report being… well, happy.

Hitachi says the idea behind the system is to help employers find ways that can increase the group’s happiness, thereby improving their productivity.

The system, which cannot be used to measure an individual’s state of mind, will go on sale in Japan in April, with each measuring tag costing 100,000 yen ($840) a year.

source: interaksyon.com

Wearable devices have bright future — survey

BEIJING — A latest survey showed that wearable devices will become more popular in the Chinese market in the next five years.

For wearable health devices, 39 percent of respondents worldwide plan to buy one by 2020, but 65 percent of Chinese consumers surveyed already have an interest in buying one, according to a survey filed to Xinhua Saturday by Accenture, a consulting and technology services company.

As many as 67 percent of Chinese consumers are likely to buy wearable fitness monitors and 73 percent wants smart watches in the coming five years, more than doubled 32 percent and 27 percent in the United States.

When buying wearable and other smart devices, Chinese consumers place features and functions as the most important factors.

However, user experience is lacking at the current time, as a staggering 83 percent of those surveyed across the globe reported various problems when they use these new types of devices.

In China, the top three issues consumers face are “too complicated to use,” “set-up did not proceed properly” and “not visually or aesthetically appealing”. Only 1 percent of Chinese respondents said they did not experience any challenges at all, the survey said.

The survey was conducted online between October and November 2014, with 24,000 respondents in 24 countries, including China, Australia, Brazil, France, Turkey and the United States.

At present, wearable devices are marketed by a number of companies, including Apple Inc., China’s Xiaomi, and Samsung from South Korea.

source: interaksyon.com