Overview
- Researchers at MIT published the capsule design and animal-test results in Nature Electronics in mid-June 2026, showing accurate temperature readings both under anesthesia and in active animals.
- The ingestible device measures about 6 mm by 4 mm, contains a custom 1 mm² silicon chip and a 1.55 V button battery, and consumes roughly 10 nanowatts to detect temperature changes of 0.01 °C.
- The pill sends data without a power-hungry radio by using backscattering, where an external antenna 30–60 cm away illuminates and reads the sensor so the device can report a temperature about once per second.
- The MIT team plans to add other vital-sign sensors such as heart-rate monitoring and aims to begin human clinical trials in the coming years to test safety and usefulness.
- If trials succeed, the sensor could provide earlier infection detection for vulnerable patients and better perioperative and athletic temperature tracking, but human safety, regulatory review and clinical value remain unproven.