Towards eco-friendly power sources: In series connected glucose biofuel cells power a disposable ovulation test

Abstract

A disposable ovulation test is operated using a flow stack of 5 in series connected glucose biofuel cells giving an open circuit voltage (OCV) of 3.5 V. Such tests consume at total around 60 μWh of energy and in average 1.7 mW of power during one run of around 12 min which are supplied by a CR1220 3 V lithium button battery in the commercialized device. We replaced this battery by the glucose biofuel cell stack and observed during the measurements and display steps peak currents up to 1.4 mA inducing a voltage drop down to 2.8 V during few seconds (4 mW of power consumption). Even such power peaks are supported by the presented biofuel cell stack assuring the necessary operational cell voltage and current. After the measurements towards Luteinizing Hormone (LH) detection the display remains turned on for 8 min and consumes just 2 μW which allows to reestablish the initial OCV and to run a further test. The presented results demonstrate as proof of concept the suitability of eco-friendly enzymatic glucose biofuel cells as alternative power source for disposable devices.