Quartz Crystal Microbalance with Dissipation Monitoring for biomedical applications: Open source and Low Cost prototype with active temperature control

Advances in sensors have revolutionized biomedical engineering, having an extreme affinity for specific analytes and providing an effective, real-time, point-of-care testing to obtain an accurate diagnosis. Quartz Crystal Microbalance (QCM) is a well-established sensor that has been successfully applied in a broad range of applications to monitor and explore various surface interactions, in situ thin-film formations, and layer properties. This technology has gained interest in biomedical applications since novel QCM systems were able to work in liquid media. Quartz crystal microbalance with dissipation monitoring (QCM-D) is an expanded version of QCM that measures changes in damping properties of adsorbed layers and provides information on its viscoelastic nature. In this article, a QCM-D prototype designed for biomedical applications was developed and its validation was done by studying the viscosity of Polyethylene Glycol (PEG). Quantification of physical properties of PEG results important for vast medical applications. The statistics show a bigger dissipation as the fluid becomes more viscous and a very acceptable sensibility of the system when temperature is controlled.