A miniaturized and flexible continuous glucose monitoring platform

The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases awarded $275,275 to Integrated Medical Sensors Inc. on September 17, 2025, under the Diabetes, Digestive, and Kidney Diseases Extramural Research program (CFDA 93.847) to develop a miniaturized and flexible continuous glucose monitoring platform.

Integrated Medical Sensors will optimize the design of its electrochemical analyte sensing platform by expanding the use of flexible electronics to create a first-in-class band-aid transmitter called "GlucoSoft." The platform uses complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology to achieve extreme miniaturization, improved signal-to-noise ratio for enhanced hypoglycemia accuracy, and on-chip temperature calibration. The unified fabrication scheme will employ flexible electronics for both the in-vivo sensor and skin-worn transmitter, enabling a thin, band-aid-like form factor designed to improve usability and acceptance among minority populations. The company has demonstrated core platform function in humans through a first-in-human feasibility study and recently verified 14-day operational feasibility in an ongoing human study. Manufacturing methods will scale production lot sizes by over 1000 times compared to current systems while simplifying factory calibration and reducing costs.

Performance occurs in California. The period of performance runs through November 30, 2026. Integrated Medical Sensors is a minority-owned small disadvantaged business located in Irvine, California.

Abstract

The long-term goal of this project is to develop a scalable, user-friendly, and affordable continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) system for better diabetes management. IMS has created the world's smallest electrochemical analyte sensing platform using an application- specific integrated circuit (ASIC) based on complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology. This design offers unique advantages, including extreme miniaturization, improved signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) for better hypoglycemia accuracy, and on-chip temperature calibration for enhanced accuracy and reliability. The system employs highly scalable semiconductor and flexible electronics manufacturing methods, increasing lot sizes by over 1000 times compared to current cgms, simplifying factory calibration, and reducing costs to improve affordability and broaden usage. We demonstrated the core IMS CGM platform's function in humans through a first-in-human (FIH) feasibility study presented at ADA 2023. Recently, we verified the feasibility of the system's 14-day operation in an ongoing human study. Our objective in this grant is to optimize the design by expanding the use of flexible electronics to create a first-in-class band-aid transmitter, as requested by clinical experts and users, to improve usability and acceptance among minority populations. This new flexible platform is named "glucosoft." this work is significant as IT will enable a fundamental improvement in CGM usability by creating the first truly flexible band-aid transmitter and decreasing costs through a unified fabrication scheme using flexible electronics for both the in vivo sensor and the skin-worn transmitter. This will be the first ever CGM with extremely thin and flexible design, hence the reference to "band aid". The team includes the original inventors of the core technology from the california institute of technology (DR. Nazari, DR. Rahman, MR. Sencan), a seasoned researcher in electrochemical sensor technology (bill van antwerp, former CSO of medtronic minimed), regulatory and IP expert (john heithaus, JD), commercialization expert (MR. Paul strasma, former CEO of capillary biomedical), clinical expert (DR. Alan marcus, MD; former chief medical officer of medtronic diabetes), and biosensors and biomaterials expert (DR. Natalie wisniewski, PH.D., former CTO of profusa, INC.).