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Procedia Engineering 168 (2016) 1681 – 1684

30th Eurosensors Conference, EUROSENSORS 2016

Low-cost Embedded Spirometer Based on commercial Micro

machined Platinum Thin Film

M. Laghrouchea,*, R.Saddaoui , I.Mellal a, M.Nachef a and S. Ameura

a
Mouloud MAMMERI University, L.A.M.P.A. Laboratory , Tizi Ouzou, Algeria

Abstract

There are great needs for a low cost and low power consumption portable spirometer for the home care of respiratory
diseases. A mobile monitoring system utilizing Bluetooth with low power and cost hardware equipment is proposed. A proof of
concept prototype has been developed and implemented to enable transmission of a flow or volume of gas during inspiratory
and expiratory process signal of a patient, which can be expanded to include other vital signs. Communication between a mobile
smartphone and the spirometer is implemented using the popular personal area network standard specification Bluetooth. The
flow measurement is done with commercial Platinum hot wire anemometer manufactured with MEMS technology. Owing to its
smallness, it has the advantage of introducing no modification of the spatial wind distribution.
© 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
© 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility ofthe organizing committee of the 30th Eurosensors Conference.
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of the 30th Eurosensors Conference
Keywords: Spirometer, mems flow sensor, microcontroler, bluetooth;

1. Introduction

Millions of adults live with chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases and suffer from asthma [1]. The measurement
of static and dynamic respiratory functions provides important indexes for asthma diagnosis. A spirometer can
measure the flow or volume of gas during inspiratory and expiratory process. In the literature, many studies have
explored an investigated the different physiological and technical methods of implementing respiratory monitoring
systems [2-4]. Modern data transmission wireless technologies, such as Bluetooth, give new possibilities to the
designers of mobile medical equipment [5-7]. To perform this measurement, we have developed a small embedded
flow sensor system prototype using Bluetooth technology with low power energy using an ATtiny85
microcontroller. The ATtiny85 can be put to sleep and in this state uses less than 6 uA of supply current. The cost of
the sensor is the most important factor because its price must be kept within the range of other equipment sold by
competitors. For the spirometer, a very small hot wire sensor has been used [8]. It consists on the basis of thermal

1877-7058 © 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of the 30th Eurosensors Conference
doi:10.1016/j.proeng.2016.11.489
1682 M. Laghrouche et al. / Procedia Engineering 168 (2016) 1681 – 1684

measuring method which is a function of the flow speed. Its sensitive element is a FS5 commercial probe, which is
integrated with measuring resistance and temperature compensating resistance inside. A constant temperature (CTA)
is chosen as conditioning circuit. The final design of the spirometer was validated by experimental testing.

2. General presentation

Our system is represented by its block diagram in Fig. 1. It consists mainly of three modules: the patient’s
acquisition and processing board, the medical storage unit in the mobile phone and the medical control unit in the
PC. The microcontroller receives the sensor signals from the analogue input through the conditioning circuit and
stores them temporarily in its EPROM memory. The data are then transferred to the mobile phone via the Bluetooth
module and finally sent to the hospital unit via the GSM network. The other possibility is to store the data at home
in a personal computer.

Flow sensor

Conditionning circuit

Fig. 1. Block diagram of the data-acquisition system.

3- Spirometer measurement system

3.1. Platinium flow sensor

It consists on the basis thermal measuring method which is a function of the flow speed. Its sensitive element is a
FS5 commercial probe constructed by ITS Innovative Sensor Technology. The resistive structure on the sensor
consists of two platinum resistors on one chip, Table 1 shows the characteristics of the flow sensor. The associated
analogue circuit (Fig. 2) is divided into 3 stages: a Wheatstone bridge circuit, a Constant Temperature Mode (CTA)
feedback circuit with a power stage and a monolithic differential amplifier circuit) with an offset compensation. The
CTA is used more often due to the possibility of temperature compensation with a fast dynamics response.

Table 1. Characteristics of the flow sensor.

Time response : 160 ms

Operating measuring rang: 0 m/s to 100 m/s
Response sensitivity: 0.01 m/s
Operating temperature range -20°C to +150°C
Heater RH(0°C)= 45Ÿ
Reference element Rs(0°C)=1200Ÿ
Dimensions (LxWxH in mm) 6.9x2.4x0.2
 M. Laghrouche et al. / Procedia Engineering 168 (2016) 1681 – 1684 1683

Wheatstone bridge

Constant temperature
circuit
To the microcontroller
Amplifier
Fig. 2. Conditioning circuit.

3.2. Central Processing Unit (CPU)

The Data Acquisition System is composed of two main subsystems: the programmable digital data acquisition
system and transducers with their associated circuits. We adopt a low-power Atmel 8-bit AVR RISC-based
microcontroller ATtiny85, it can be put to sleep and in this state uses less than 6 uA of supply current. It is
principally composed of 8KB ISP flash memory, 512B EEPROM, 512-Byte SRAM, 6 general purpose I/O lines, 32
general purpose working registers, one 8-bit timer/counter with compare modes, one 8-bit high speed timer/counter,
USI, internal and external Interrupts, 4-channel 10-bit A/D converter, programmable watchdog timer with internal
oscillator and three software selectable power saving modes,. The device achieves a throughput of 20 MIPS at 20
MHz and operates between 2.7-5.5 volts. The Ezurio Bluetooth Intelligent Serial Module II (BISM II) is the device
selected for the wireless module. This system can use UART interface to carry out the data transmission between the
module and the microcontroller.

4. Experimental result

The final design of the spirometer was validated by experimental testing (Fig. 3). The readings on the calibration
analyzer are recorded and plotted against the Va output of the analog circuit. (Fig. 4) shows that the flow rate is a
quadratic variation of the output voltage in a flow range from 0 to 40 L/s. Fig. 5 shows the area integral of resultant
flow-time curves which gives well repeatability with the digital output for 6 breath cycles. For instance, the indoor
tests performed in wind tunnel have shown that the wind sensors under study are sensitive, reproducible and
reliable. The developed spirometer has the ability to communicate with a personal computer through Bluetooth
protocol. This facilitates the storage of spirometric data for analysis, records, printouts and other usage.
Bluetooth

FS5 hot wire sensor

anemometer

Data acquisition 3V DC Power Supply

system
Fig .3. A picture of the portable spirometer.
1684 M. Laghrouche et al. / Procedia Engineering 168 (2016) 1681 – 1684

Time (s)
Fig.4. Measuring flow rate versus voltage for the spirometer. Fig.5. Digital output of the spirometer translated into flow rate
information.

5. Conclusion

According to our experimental results, the proposed system is proved to be feasible and low cost. The non-
invasive nature of the technique makes it an attractive tool, in both the research and clinical settings. The use of an
autonomous ambulatory system enables to the patient to remain free in his movements during the signal acquisition.
The micro sensor has the advantage of introducing no modification of the spatial wind distribution. Our wireless
transmission system permits to memorize the data acquired in the patient’s mobile phone, and then to transmit them
to the processing unit of the hospital through the GSM net. The presence of the patient in the hospital becomes no
longer necessary and the distance separating the patient and the hospital is no longer a constraint.

References

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