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Miniaturized electronic packaging for

wearable health monitors


Jayna Sheats
Terepac Corporation, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

Market needs
Technology needs
What Terepac does to address both

11th Annual MEPTEC MEMS Technology Symposium, San Jose, CA;


22 May 2013

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Personal medical monitors: a popular topic!

Eric Topol demonstrating AliveCor ECG


to Stephen Colbert

Remote Patient Monitoring Market To


Double By 2016
By Nicole Lewis InformationWeek
July 25, 2012 08:46 AM

Wearable wireless medical devices to top 100 million units annually by 2016
Julien Happich 8/21/2011 11:20 AM EDT (EE Times)

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

What would be the ideal form?


The Tricorder...
Powerful, yes - but not wearable!
What if people could wear sensors during
normal daily activities, which provide
advance notice of any medical issue, and
even prescribe the appropriate
intervention?

Key parameters to monitor:


Heart (pulse rate, ECG waveform)
Blood pressure and flow
Oxygen, CO2, glucose
Body position and motion
(has the wearer fallen?)
Strain during exercise
(From Smartex)
Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

What's available today


Isansys ECG

Healthstats BPM

Preventice ECG

Withings

MIT BPM

Nordic/IDT

UMich glucose

(Experimental)
Wearable, yes; but not necessarily with comfort or discreteness

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Terepac Corporation
Giving Voice to the World
Terepac's goal is to integrate electronics into the world we live in

From data collection

Small products

Pervasive electronics

Ultrasmall chips:
160x160 m, 25 m thick

To data analysis
Data analytics
Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

Big Data
collection
April 2013

Core Technology: Printing Integrated Circuits


(a) Pre-press

(b) Printing

Diced, thin chips are transferred en masse to transfer


substrate coated with Digital Release AdhesiveTM

Printhead is brought into


proximity of substrate

Light + heat causes vaporization


of the DRA, leaving chip adhered
to adjacent substrate
Thin, diced wafer (preferably <50 m) on thermal or
UV release adhesive on framed backing tape

Printhead removes array of chips (on the


underside of printhead; no change in relative
position from wafer)

Only chips selected by optical exposure (shown in


blue) are printed when the DRA is heated (T<150C).
One or multiple chips can be printed simultaneously.

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Planar surface for interconnects

a) Components placed face down on a


temporary substrate with release coating
b) Curable encapsulant coated and partially
cured (B-staged)

c) Permanent substrate laminated onto the


encapsulant, which is now cured to
completion
d) The permanent substrate is delaminated
from the release layer and turned over

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Optimally and rapidly designed micromodules


0.3 mm

0.50 mm

1.50 mm

0.95 mm

A typical monolithically
integrated wireless sensor
(passive RFID type)

A Terepac micromodule with


each subunit optimally designed
for the customer's application
No need for new IC masks
Immediate debugging

Any type of component can be incorporated with equal ease (MEMS,


different types or sizes of memory, optoelectronics, organic devices, thin film
batteries, energy harvesters, ...)

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Micromodules
2.45 GHz
radio chip
4mm
Microprocessor

The circuit below is a


complete ECG monitor
(less electrodes and
battery): the ICs are 1/6 of
the thickness of the
substrate

Terepac
Test Chip
160um

Areas where MEMS can


contribute to the product
characteristics
independent of sensors
Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

The value of real microcircuits


Photochemical Component Assembly
Ultrasmall
products

Flexible
design
Faster, cheaper
design cycle

Cheaper (less Si
area)

Uses smaller, higheryielding IC components


Lower power (fewer
transistors)

Optimum match to
customer needs

Fits into small spaces


(body implants, plants,
etc.)

Any technology no
fabrication incompatibility

Ultrathin
products

Flexible (e.g.,
wearable)

Fits product easily


(e.g. label)

More reliable printed


interconnect

Small product runs are


economical
Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

Opportunities
What can MEMS do for wearable wireless sensors?

Sensors
Lower power RF components
Low power non-volatile memory (e.g. relays)
Passive components
Frequency control (oscillators)
What can PCA printing do for MEMS?

Thinner, more flexible packages


Lower packaging cost
Potentially higher reliability

Not for dissemination or copying without explicit permission of Terepac Corp.

April 2013

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