Electronic Pill Piston Mechanism for Compact Medication Delivery
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing electronic pills for medication delivery have large dimensions due to the need for high mechanical stiffness in the spring mechanism, which compromises the impulse for releasing medication, leading to increased device size and swallowing difficulties.
Innovation Solution
The electronic pill employs a mechanism that limits piston displacement during configuration change, preserving stress and allowing for high velocity impact, enabling smaller primary elastic element stiffness and dimensions, along with modular design for easier handling and quality control.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Force
If a polymer thread is used to constrain the piston and a heating element is used to fuse it, then the piston can be released from its constrained position, but the continuous fusing process causes gradual reduction in the polymer's modulus of elasticity, increasing strain and allowing significant piston displacement before breakage, which dissipates the piston's impulse and requires a relatively large mechanical stiffness spring, thereby increasing device dimensions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent pre-stresses the spring to a high level before piston release, storing maximum potential energy. The mechanism ensures that when the polymer thread fuses, the piston is already positioned to maximize the spring's stored energy, allowing the piston to achieve high velocity impact on the medication despite gradual polymer failure. This preliminary positioning resolves the contradiction by ensuring sufficient impulse force is generated even with the polymer's gradual failure mode.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the polymer material parameters by selecting a thermoplastic with specific properties that balance between maintaining constraint during swallowing and enabling controlled release. The heating element parameters are also optimized to fuse the polymer at a specific temperature threshold, ensuring that the polymer maintains its elastic modulus during normal conditions but fails in a controlled manner during release, preserving piston impulse while managing device dimensions.
2Reliability
If the spring is designed with relatively large mechanical stiffness to compensate for lost piston impulse, then the piston can still release the medication, but the spring's larger coil diameter or compression length increases the device dimensions
Solution Approach 1:
The spring is pre-compressed to its maximum capacity before the piston needs to move, storing the necessary energy in advance. This preliminary action allows the spring to have smaller dimensions while still providing sufficient force, because the energy is already stored in a compact state rather than requiring a large coil diameter or compression length to generate the force on demand.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses a rapid heating pulse to fuse the polymer thread, creating a brief but intense thermal event that releases the piston. This periodic action allows the spring to remain in a pre-compressed state for most of the device's life, then rapidly release its stored energy in a short time window, achieving reliable medication release with a more compact spring design.
3Stability of the object's composition
If the piston is allowed to significantly displace before the polymer thread breaks, then the polymer can maintain constraint during swallowing, but the piston velocity upon impact is negligible, dissipating the impulse needed for effective medication release
Solution Approach 1:
The patent selects a thermoplastic polymer with specific thermal and mechanical parameters that maintain high elastic modulus at body temperature during swallowing, providing stable piston constraint. When the heating element raises the polymer temperature above its glass transition temperature, the polymer's modulus of elasticity drops sharply, causing rapid failure and high piston velocity. This parameter change resolves the contradiction by maintaining stability during normal conditions while enabling rapid release when triggered.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces a purely mechanical constraint system with a thermally activated release mechanism. Instead of relying on mechanical interlocking or friction to hold the piston, the system uses the polymer's thermal response to control release timing. This substitution allows the piston to remain constrained with high stability during swallowing but achieve rapid acceleration when the thermal trigger is activated, resolving the velocity-stability contradiction.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution results in a significantly smaller electronic pill that is easier to swallow, with improved patient compliance and reduced power requirements, while maintaining effective medication release and increasing economic feasibility and medical efficacy.
Implementation Method 1
The miniature heating element fuses off the polymer thread when the remotely controlled module receives a control signal
Implementation Method 2
a primary elastic element for applying said predefined level of pressure to the reservoir via a piston upon release from the piston of its constrained position
Data Source
AI summary
The invention relates to an electronic pill (102) for delivery of a medication (104) inside a mammal. The electronic pill (102) comprises a reservoir (106) for releasing the medication (104) in response to a predefined level of pressure. Furthermore a primary elastic element (108) is comprised for applying said predefined level of pressure to the reservoir (106) via a piston (110) upon release from the piston (110) of its constrained position. The piston (110) in its turn, when in constrained position, induces a predefined level of stress in the primary elastic element (108) by accordingly deforming it. The electronic pill (102) comprises a mechanism (114) for changing, upon actuation, from a constraining configuration in which the piston (110) is maintained at its constrained position to a releasing configuration in which the piston (110) is released. The mechanism (112) limits the displacement of the piston (110) during changing between said configurations to a level which is substantially smaller than the deformation introduced in the primary elastic element (108).