Application of piezo transducers in biomedical science for health monitoring and energy harvesting problems

In order to ensure sound health of living being at clinical stages it is necessary to continuously monitor the physical and biological changes in body organs and tissues like bone, skin, ligaments etc occurs due to injury or healing processes. Various newly advent smart materials such as piezo's and their nano composites have find its splendid applications in monitoring the stability of these tissues and dental implantations. In this review paper we put emphasis on latest technologies and materials involved in harnessing biomechanical energy efficiently that may be used for driving implanted medical devices ultimately providing a prominent solution to in-vitro and in-vivo energy harvesting practices. The paper also highlights different studies communicating a systematic procedure for monitoring the condition of biological host while using piezo-based materials such as Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT) or their nano composites. For health monitoring purpose, we outline the implementation of Electro-Mechanical Impedance (EMI) technique using piezo patch discussing its sensitiveness and advantages over presently based methods. A state-of-art review is made comparing various recently reported studies either experimental or numerical accessed by modeling finite elements system along with PZT patch bonded to specimen simulating the healing progress during or after surgery. The paper also focuses the main problems associated in implementing the present technologies while using these types of materials as a sensor or harvester in medical sciences and consecutively offers their potential solutions. A deep comparative analysis for output power generation capability is also carried out by studying diverse literature work associated with recently discovered smart nano composites and piezo's while discussing their eminency of having bio-compatible nature and lower modal frequency ranges relative to other commercially available devices that may ultimately help the researchers from all around the world in fabricating more effective self-powered flexible ultra-thin implantable electronic devices in field of bio-medical sciences.