Researchers at the University of Cambridge and startup company GlitterinTech have developed a tiny, low-cost device that could bring powerful chemical sensing capabilities to wearable technology.
The new device is an optical spectrometer—a tool that analyzes how light interacts with materials.
Spectrometers are widely used in science, medicine, manufacturing, and environmental monitoring because they can identify substances and measure their chemical properties.
However, traditional spectrometers are often large, expensive, and confined to laboratories.
The new spectrometer changes that. The researchers have created a chip-sized version that costs only about $10 to produce while delivering accuracy comparable to much larger laboratory instruments.
The breakthrough comes from a completely new way of measuring light.
Traditional spectrometers usually work by splitting light into different colors, much like a prism creates a rainbow. Smaller versions often sacrifice accuracy, resolution, or measurement range in order to reduce size and cost.
The Cambridge team took a different approach. Instead of separating light into individual colors, their device performs a mathematical operation called convolution directly within the optical system itself.
This allows the spectrometer to gather detailed information about light in a much simpler and more efficient way.
According to the researchers, this design provides high accuracy, strong resistance to noise, and requires very little computing power to process the results.
The device was built using integrated photonic technology, which uses light rather than electricity to process information. Despite being only about a centimeter in size, it can analyze a broad range of near-infrared light and produce results in less than a second.
One of the most impressive aspects of the new spectrometer is its versatility.
In testing, the device successfully identified a wide range of materials, including plastics, medicines, coffee, tea, and flour. It achieved a 100% success rate in classification tasks.
The researchers also used it to measure chemical concentrations in liquids with extremely high accuracy, reaching precision levels of around 0.01%. In some cases, it even outperformed commercial laboratory spectrometers.
Perhaps the most exciting demonstrations involved human health monitoring.
The team showed that the device could measure several important health indicators without drawing blood or collecting samples. It successfully monitored skin moisture levels, blood alcohol content, blood lactate levels, and blood glucose.
Blood glucose monitoring is especially important for people with diabetes. The researchers demonstrated glucose tracking over extended periods in a participant, suggesting that future wearable devices could continuously monitor blood sugar without the need for finger-prick tests.
The spectrometer also proved remarkably durable. It continued operating accurately across temperatures ranging from minus 20 degrees Celsius to 80 degrees Celsius. This level of stability is essential for wearable devices, industrial applications, and outdoor environmental monitoring.
Another major advantage is simplicity. Many compact spectrometers rely on complex calibration procedures and powerful computers to interpret data. The new design requires much less processing power, making it easier to integrate into everyday products.
The researchers believe their invention could help make chemical sensing as common as temperature or motion sensing is today.
Future applications could include smartwatches that monitor health, sensors that check food quality in real time, systems that detect environmental pollutants, and industrial tools that continuously monitor manufacturing processes.
By combining advanced mathematics, photonic technology, and practical engineering, the team has created a device that could bring laboratory-level chemical analysis into the hands—and onto the wrists—of everyday people.
