Presenter:

Dr. Xiaolin Zheng, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering

Stanford University

A study by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published in 2014 revealed that ~29 million people in the U.S. have diabetes and ~ 86 million has prediabetes –nearly a third of the U.S. adult population. The estimated diabetes costs in the U.S. is about $245 billion in 2012. Currently, diabetes patients monitor their blood glucose levels through the expensive and invasive finger prick test, imposing a great hurdle for blood glucose monitoring at regular intervals. Hence, developing a non-invasive technique for blood glucose measurement is of utmost importance today.
The concentration of acetone (C₃H₆O) in human breath has been suggested to correlate with the blood glucose level, with concentration below 0.9 ppm for the healthy range and above 1.8 ppm for diabetic range. Therefore, development of an economical, reliable and portable acetone sensor will not only facilitate diabetes patients manage their conditions but also monitor the progression for healthy states to prediabetes to diabetes.
The state-of-art acetone sensor in terms of sensitivity is based on the semiconductor silicon-doped tungsten oxide (Si:WO₃) film with the detection limit of 20 bbp, but it only works well at 350^oC. Such a high operation temperature imposes a challenge for portable breath sensors. Here, we propose to test the hypothesis if the operation temperature of Si:WO₃ for acetone sensor can be lowered by coupling with catalysts, such as molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂). The success of the proposed project will lead to a miniaturized, sensitive, selective, fast-response, low-temperature acetone gas sensor that can be integrated into wearable electronic devices for non-invasive diagnosis of diabetes.

ABOUT DR. ZHENG
Professor Zheng received her Ph.D. in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University (2006), B.S. in Thermal Engineering from Tsinghua University (2000). Prior to joining Stanford in 2007, Professor Zheng did her postdoctoral work in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University. Professor Zheng is a member of MRS, ACS and combustion institute. Professor Zheng received the Resonate Award from the Resnick Institute at Caltech (2016), Nano Letters Young Investigator Lectureship (2015), David Filo and Jerry Yang Scholar (2015), National Geographic Emerging Explorer Award (2014), TR35 Award from the MIT Technology Review (2013), one of the 100 Leading Global Thinkers by the Foreign Policy Magazine (2013), 3M Nontenured Faculty Grant Award (2013), the Presidential Early Career Award (PECASE) from the white house (2009), Young Investigator Awards from the ONR (2008), DARPA (2008), Terman Fellowship from Stanford (2007), and Bernard Lewis Fellowship from the Combustion Institute (2004).

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