Up for Review: Wearable Sweat Sensor for Monitoring Dehydration

https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/news-preview/105133

Please note that Robert has done a cursory readthrough of this article but may have more edits to add later. Note, too, that the images will likely change before publication.
I enjoyed this article. This is the first time I can remember seeing a News report in this forum and I think it is a good read and informative. You have taken the mystery out of what they did by presenting it in a very straightforward manner. This reader as well as the author was led to contemplate how else it could be done and I think that is a good sign.

I have one small technical issue that could be corrected with a simple word change. “One of the most common biosensors is the glucometer, …” I would argue that glucose biosensors don’t even crack the top three. I have no numbers, but I would think that a thermometer, pedometer or even photoplethysmography–based sensors are far more common.

The last point is a little more difficult to describe. If you search on Google scholar for the Nature Letters paper you will also see a link for “Cited by”. In this case that list has 177 entries, which means to me that the report, that is now almost two years old, has had a substantial impact.

Not sure how exactly you can communicate that this arena is a large one with lots of players, but maybe even one short pph to that end would be called for. Maybe even referring to one or two by name (e.g., Sweatch or a review like this one )

Ray
 

RK37

Joined Jun 26, 2015
677
Thanks for the input, Raymond. Do you think it would be acceptable if we revise to, "One common type of biosensor is the glucometer..."?
 
Thanks for the input, Raymond. Do you think it would be acceptable if we revise to, "One common type of biosensor is the glucometer..."?
Yeah, I think so.

It's a bit beyond the point, but I came across this ppt as a pdf from an Irish group at a symposium last year. It's really an interesting topic. They include the Nature letter that is the subject of the present article. If you look at slide 18 & 19, they make a pretty compelling case for why some of these biosensors are so difficult to turn into useful projects.
 

ohoilett

Joined Feb 3, 2014
6
Thanks for the comments Robert and Raymond. I like the points made in slide 18 and 19. My lab is working on similar solutions. Coincidentally, I was planning on applying the suggestion on slide 19 to my PhD project.

Anyways, thanks for your suggestions on the article and for the compliments. I would say that within my academic sphere, I've usually heard biosensors in the context of measuring a biochemical quantity, not necessarily just a physiological response. But that might be due to the fact that I had a Biological/Bioengineering professor for my class. Additionally, the definition of a biosensor really isn't solidified, so not a big deal. I have no objection to changing the wording to "One common type of biosensor is the glucometer..." like Robert suggested.

Regarding your second point how about something like this? And I think this could fit either in the intro or the conclusions.
"Biosensors have extraordinary impact in the consumer and research space ranging from applications in glucose monitoring to cancer detection. In recent years, the quantified self movement has increased the demand for wearable biosensors prompting researchers to investigate new ways to bring laboratory technologies to the hands and homes of consumers."

Robert, is the preview a living document? As in, can I make changes in the CMS and have them reflected in the page without updating the link?
 
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RK37

Joined Jun 26, 2015
677
Hi Orlando,

Let's see what Raymond thinks about those new sentences you suggested. He knows much more about the biomedical sector than I do.

The article preview page reflects whatever has been saved into the CMS. So if you go into the CMS and make changes and save them via the "Submit" button, the preview page will reflect those changes when you open it or refresh it. However, after you submit an article, be sure to notify me or Kate before you make changes in the CMS. (If the article is in the "Pending Review" column, notify Kate; otherwise, notify me.) This is important, because revisions can be lost if two people are logged into the CMS and working on the same article at the same time.
 

ohoilett

Joined Feb 3, 2014
6
Okay great. Just out of curiosity, I noticed that "et al." is no longer italicized in the preview. Is that an editorial change or something that didn't transfer from the CMS? Also the last paragraph is really offset from everything else.
 

RK37

Joined Jun 26, 2015
677
On my screen the last two paragraphs are separated from the rest of the "In Summary..." section by a horizontal line with extra space before and after. This is a low-key way of separating a concluding sentence or section from a larger section that otherwise would assimilate it. I didn't add that, but I use the technique in my articles and I think it works well here.

I removed the italicization for "et al." because the typical rule applies: foreign terms that have become standardized as English terminology are not italicized. Furthermore, The Chicago Manual of Style is explicit with regard to "et al.": "Commonly used Latin words and abbreviations should not be italicized," and "et al." is given as one of the examples.
 

ohoilett

Joined Feb 3, 2014
6
Okay. I took another look through the article again. One more point of note, "biomedical engineering" and names of disciplines are usually capitalized in the contexts I am used to. But if that's not the case here, that's fine.

I cited Nature Letters in two of the circuit diagrams in the article. I recreated the circuit diagrams myself. The images used in the preview are not screenshots. However, I cited the original publication just to ensure correct appropriation went back to the authors and to the journal.
 

RK37

Joined Jun 26, 2015
677
Okay. I took another look through the article again. One more point of note, "biomedical engineering" and names of disciplines are usually capitalized in the contexts I am used to. But if that's not the case here, that's fine.

I cited Nature Letters in two of the circuit diagrams in the article. I recreated the circuit diagrams myself. The images used in the preview are not screenshots. However, I cited the original publication just to ensure correct appropriation went back to the authors and to the journal.
In less-formal contexts (such as AAC articles), names of disciplines are not capitalized. In most American (and maybe British as well, I'm not sure) publishing environments, the trend these days is referred to as "down style," i.e., less capitalization. But in any event, these are details that we (meaning the AAC editors) don't worry about too much . . . we stay busy enough just trying to get good content published on time.

@Kate Smith Kate, do you have any comment on the status of the diagrams? Do we have usage issues if Orlando created the diagrams himself?
 
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