Ingestible Electronics for Diagnostics and Therapy

The gastrointestinal (GI) tract offers the opportunity to detect physiological and pathophysiological signals from the human body. Ingestible electronics can gain close proximity to major organs through the GI tract and therefore, can serve as clinical tools for diagnostics and therapy. In this Review, we summarize physiologic and anatomic characteristics of the GI tract, which present both challenges and opportunities for the development of ingestible devices. We describe recent breakthroughs in material science, electrical engineering, and data science that have permitted exploration of technologies for both sensing and therapy via the GI tract. Novel sensing opportunities include electrochemical, electromagnetic, optical, and acoustic protocols, with capacity to sense luminal or extra-luminal analytes in the GI tract. We review novel therapeutic interventions such as anatomic targeting of drug delivery, enhanced drug delivery including the delivery of macromolecules and potentially the delivery of electrical signals as the therapy. Finally, we investigate major challenges associated with ingestible electronics, including safety, communication, powering, steering and tissue interactions. Ingestible electronics are an exciting arena of scientific innovation and they may pave the way for a novel area in medicine, enabling patients to receive remote, electronically-assisted health care.