- A new implantable radio chip intended for medical applications
now has been announced - but can forced tracking of everyone with
this type of technology be far behind? Would anyone believe that any manufacturer
would pass up a chance to implant hundreds of millions of people, and limit
implants a small minority of medical patients as design-in product for
cardiac, insulin pumps, etc...? This new device is FAR more sophisticated
than the well publicized "Digital Angel" chip, pictures of which
usually show a grain-of-rice-size transparent capsule with a coil
at one end and a chip at the other.
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- How big is this new chip? It comes in two forms
- a bare chip (or in "die form" as it's called in the electronics
industry) and a 48 pin plastic package as shown below. The plastic
version in the picture below is not to scale - this device is actually
a fraction of the size of a postage stamp measuring just 7mm x 7mm. In
inches that's about 1/4" square or about the size of a #2 pencil eraser.
However, packed into that small size is a 402-405MHz transmitter for operation
in the "implantable medical service band", 2.4GHz receiver, Media
Access Controller/processor, error detection and data recording capability
for later transmission. It can also be connected to an external 2.5GHz
transmitter for other purposes. Unlike the dirt-simple Digital Angel
technology which has already been hacked and can only send back a
simple serial number, this is a COMPLETE system-on-a-chip with numerous
capabilities including Reed-Solomon encoding. This encoding method is intended
for high noise level signals and provides a high level of data integrity.
This encoding method is also used by the both Voyager spacecraft to
send images to Earth even today from outside our solar system. Although
this chip does require a few external electronic parts, each of these
external components are about the size of a grain of sand.
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- Without the plastic package shown, the bare chip
is about this size: [ ]
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- A powerful chip like this would undoubtedly be the choice
for police state implants. Whether or not digital angel is upgraded to
meet this challenge, what we see here is the next generation of implants
that will be competing for government approval for mass implantation. And
if it can receive medical band signals - why not a satellite signal to
release a toxin? Just 20 years ago, you needed a 10ft. dish to receive
radio and television from satellite. Now look at a GPS you can hold
in your hand. And that's already old technology.
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- Here is a recent technical product announcement from
the company:
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- **** Begin announcement ****
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- Radio Chip Gets Under The Skin
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- For medical applications that include implanted pacemakers,
defibrillators, neural stimulators, drug pumps, and physiological monitors,
the ZL70101 transceiver, an ultra low-power RF system-on-a-chip promises
high data rates, low power consumption, and employs unique wake-up circuitry.
The device uses the company's MICS technology, which eliminates the need
for accurately positioning an inductive wand over the implanted device.
Data can be stored in the implanted medical device's memory and wirelessly
transmitted to a base station without patient intervention. The transceiver
integrates a wake-up receiver that allows it to operate in sleep mode,
consuming 250 nA of current. Communication is then initiated using a specially
coded wake-up signal from the base station transmitter. In full operation,
the ZL70101 typically consumes 5 mA of supply current. Available as implantable-grade,
wire-bondable die or in a 48-pin QFN (quad flat no-lead) package, the chip
is fully supported by a reference system and application-development kit.
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- **** End of announcement ****
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- POWER CONSUMPTION EXPLAINED
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- Note the actual current consumption during FULL operation
is 5mA. That's .005 Amps, or about 1/20 of the current of a flashlight
bulb. A cordless phone draws several hundred times this current from the
battery. This chip's standby current of 250nA (nanoamps) = .000000250 Amps,
or 250 BILLIONTHS of an amp. It can still record data for later transmission
while sleeping at this extremely low power level according to the company's
data sheet.
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- This chip could easily be powered without batteries by
using motion transducers, zero point devices or with electrochemical
power sources - also implanted in your body when the chip
is installed. So are you ready to roll up your sleeve to accept something
like this one day?
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- Ted Twietmeyer
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- www.data4science.net
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- Source: EE Product News and Zarlink company website
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