A Battery-Free, Lightweight Wearable Platform Enabled by Material–Antenna Co-Design

Effective health monitoring is essential for managing chronic diseases, yet current solutions face challenges such as infrastructure dependence, data gaps, and poor user experience. We introduce a low-cost, low-power wearable sensing platform that leverages advanced materials to enable continuous, near-clinical health tracking in everyday environments.

Our work consists of three key innovations:

• We miniaturize the antenna and embed it into existing wearables like contact lenses to enable long-range backscatter communication (see SmartLens).
• We enhance the antenna's functionality by integrating sensing capabilities directly into its structure using advanced materials, without compromising communication performance (see Cyclops).
• We unify these capabilities into a versatile, plug-and-play platform for multi-modal, wireless, and battery-free wearable sensing (see OhmScanner).