All-in-One Bio Chip
Samsung Electronics announced on Dec. 29 it is addressing the growing demand of quantified health with an all-in-one advanced system logic chip for the health wearables market, called a Bio-Processor. The bioprocessing chip, now in mass production, is specially designed to accelerate the development of innovative wearable products for consumers who are increasingly monitoring their health and fitness on a daily basis.
“Samsung’s Bio-Processor, which can process five different biometric signals, is the most versatile health and fitness monitoring chip available on the market today and is expected to open up many new health-based service options for our customers,” said Ben K. Hur, vice president of the marketing and system LSI business at Samsung Electronics.
Samsung’s Bio-Processor is the industry’s first all-in-one health solution chip. It integrates not only Analog Front Ends (AFE), but also a microcontroller unit (MCU), power management integrated circuit (PMIC), digital signal processor (DSP), and eFlash memory. The chip enables processing of the bio-signals it measures without any need of external processing parts. The incredibly small size also defines its innovative integrated design. The size of the Bio-Processor is just about one fourth the size of the total device, which is ideal for small wearable devices and offers plenty of options when designing new devices.
While the need of heart rate monitoring alone may have been compelling in the past, the ability to measure a variety of fitness data is required for wearable products these days. To meet such demands, Samsung has designed its biochip to integrate five AFEs – including bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA), photoplethysmogram (PPG), electrocardiogram (ECG), skin temperature, and galvanic skin response (GSR) – into a single chip that can measure body fat, skeletal muscle mass, heart rate, heart rhythm, skin temperature and stress level, which are considered to be all of the parameters for fitness.
To accelerate the development and better understanding of the new Bio-Processor, Samsung has arranged several wearable reference platforms to be available for demonstrating various applications. For example, wristband, board and patch type reference devices show and demonstrate the Bio-Processor’s potential and ability to measure multiple fitness variables with an extremely small device.
The Samsung Bio-Processor will be applicable to fitness and health devices in the first half of 2016.