ST's MEMS Inertial Sensors Empower High-End Medical Devices, Enabling Precise Upgrades for Wearable and Implantable Equipment

STMicroelectronics (ST) has recently launched the MIS2DU12 MEMS accelerometer, which combines ultra-low power consumption, signal processing, and an ultra-thin profile, making it ideal for wearable and implantable medical devices.

Manufactured using biocompatible materials and processes, the MIS2DU12 MEMS accelerometer features a shutdown current of 20nA and an operating current below 1µA, extending the battery life of implantable medical devices such as heart monitors and pacemakers. With a height of just 0.74mm and dimensions of 2mm x 2mm, the chip enables skin patches that are extremely thin, lightweight, and comfortable to wear.

In skin patches for bioparameter sensors such as glucose monitors, the MIS2DU12's sensor fusion technology ensures detection accuracy even during gross motion and environmental stress. Target applications benefit from its excellent low-motion sensitivity and high energy efficiency. A dedicated motion processing engine handles free-fall detection, sleep/wake-up, single/double tap, activity/inactivity status, and calculates 6D/4D orientation. The product also includes a built-in self-test function and an embedded temperature sensor.

The MIS2DU12 integrates a motion processor for event detection and wake-up, and to maximize output data quality, it also incorporates an anti-aliasing filter. This filter removes out-of-band vibration noise sources, thereby reducing the workload on the main application processor and lowering system power consumption. In ultra-low-power mode with an output data rate of 1.6Hz, the sensor consumes just 0.47µA; in normal mode with the anti-aliasing filter enabled, power consumption is 5.6µA.

The MIS2DU12 offers user-selectable full scales of ±2g/±4g/±8g/±16g, output data rates from 1.6Hz to 800Hz, and an operating temperature range of -40°C to +85°C. The integrated 128-level FIFO buffer provides developers with ample data storage and more flexible power modes, further reducing system power consumption.

To facilitate rapid evaluation of the chip's functions, the STEVAL-MKI255A adapter board features the MIS2DU12 MEMS accelerometer and adopts a standard DIL24 pinout, making it compatible with the STEVAL-MKI109D evaluation board. This board integrates a high-performance 32-bit microcontroller and works directly with ST's MEMS Studio graphical user interface.

The MIS2DU12 is available in a 2.0mm x 2.0mm x 0.74mm plastic land grid array (LGA) package and is expected to be launched in mid-2026. Additionally, ST offers the companion STEVAL-MKI109D evaluation board.