Finger-Worn Dense Pressure-Sensor Array for Arterial Pulse Acquisition

This paper reports a finger-worn dense pressure-sensor array, with which arterial pulse signal can be acquired simultaneously during pulse-taking, and rapid pulse positioning and dynamic pulse width measurement of the radial artery has been achieved for the first time. Because the width of a radial artery is only approximately 2.5-3 mm, very dense sensor arrays must be developed to distinguish changes in pulse width. An array of 18 ultra-small MEMS pressure sensors (0.4 × 0.4 mm each) with a pitch of 0.65 mm is packaged on a flexible printed circuit board. Because the array has an effective span of 11.6 mm, which is 3–5 times the diameter of the human radial artery, the search for the radial artery during pulse-taking is facilitated naturally. Furthermore, a measuring scheme for dynamic pulse width is developed in this study. The pulses of three volunteers are measured using the system, and the results of the dynamic pulse width measurement are consistent with those obtained by color Doppler ultrasound.