There is an increased need for sensors to monitor environmental conditions, that are not dependent on outside power. Remote sensors are used for this purpose, but they either require wiring to a power source or periodic maintenance to replace batteries. The difficulties with each approach severely limit the ability to obtain reliable information on environmental conditions. The purpose of this work is to develop an integrated hybrid power supply for miniature, electrochemical remote sensors to detect biological conditions. With this power supply, sensors can be truly "autonomous,". Inexpensive sensors can then be distributed throughout a domain of interest. Sensors that use the hybrid power supply can be used to detect a wide range of environ-mental phenomena, such as chemical conditions, motion, humidity and temperature, and state-of-health conditions. The end result of this work will be an autonomous "lab-on-a-chip." It will be wireless for both power and data transmission, and can detect multiple phenomena simultaneously. POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS Miniature autonomous "lab on a chip" devices can be used to monitor environmental conditions, home security, and health of many engineering systems. They can be useful in scientific work as well. The emerging Bluetooth technologies would be benefited by remote autonomous multisensors described in this proposal. The potential market for these devices is tens of millions of dollars per year.
