Medical Wireless and Remote Sensor Devices

The ZL 70250 radio chip is designed to be used in on-body devices like electrocardiograms (ECGs) that record heart activity, oximetry systems that measure oxygen levels in the blood (SpO2), continuous glucose monitors (CGM) for diabetes patients, and sound and voice communication systems. The radio chip is also being used in devices that operate inside very confined spaces such as inside the mouth.

 

Consuming less that 2mW with an efficiency of 11nJ/bit, the ZL70250 radio chip allows designers to significantly reduce the size of wireless devices. Also, the ultra-low power performance allows the device to be operated directly from coin cell batteries.

 

The radio chip's low power feature makes it suited for "green" communication systems powered by energy-harvesting techniques. The solar powered wireless sensor networks are used to monitor environmental changes, and on-body medical devices that gather power from body heat.

 

"Zarlink has solved the power and size challenges faced by designers when developing compact wireless devices that must support continuous monitoring," says Didier Sagan, marketing manager with Zarlink's Medical Products Group.

 

"Zarlink is a leading provider of ultra-low power radios for the medical telemetry market. Building on this expertise, the ZL70250 chip makes wireless telemetry possible in a new generation of devices. In addition, the highly integrated chip and supporting application development kit helps simplify design complexity, reduce component count, and speed time-to-market," Sagan explains.

 

Regarding the chip’s ultra low-power performance, it consumes 2mA total in both transmit and receive mode to enable extremely long battery life or very small battery size without requiring bulky charge storage capacitors. The very low supply voltage of 1V to 2V further reduces power consumption and allows the device to be powered from a single-cell battery. It has a user interface control to customize parameters depending on the application to optimize power use.

 

The chip operates in the 795MHz to 965MHz frequency bands, and offers data rates up to 186kbps at distances like a few hundred meters.