Enabling non-invasive glucose measurement for diabetes management: A communication engineering approach

Funding Agency: KACST and Lockheed Martine

Status: In-Progress

Diabetes is a chronic disease that is reaching epidemical levels worldwide and particularly in Saudi Arabia. The goal of diabetes management (diabetic control) is to maintain blood glucose as close to normal as possible to reduce the risk of long-term diabetic complications. Facilitating rapid non-invasive testing would have a highly beneficial impact on the management of diabetes. This project aims to re-visit the NIR spectroscopy challenge for non-invasive glucose monitoring by adopting a new methodology more akin to communications engineering than analytical chemistry. In this methodology more focus is put on novel signal processing (data analysis/coding) techniques to investigate the extent of such techniques and assess whether or not they are able to overcome the practical limitations associated with current offerings. These techniques will be characterized by their adaptive properties to a range of SNRs and spectral resolutions. The work will be supported by specialized experiments to enable translation into clinic. Team from KSU and Sheffield University are collaborating to achieve the goals of this project.