Bluetooth Low Energy fertility tracker helps women conceive by analyzing fertility hormone data and providing personalized ovulation predictions

Nordic Semiconductor today announces that Quanovate, a San Francisco, CA-based healthcare technology company, has selected Nordic’s nRF52832 System-on-Chip (SoC) to provide the Bluetooth® Low Energy (Bluetooth LE) wireless connectivity for its ‘Mira™’ ovulation and fertility tracking system.

The palm-sized Mira device is designed to help women conceive by providing actual hormone readings and personalized ovulation cycle predictions that are calculated through the measurement of fertility hormone concentrations collected from urine samples on test wands.  

Once the user has collected a urine sample using a test wand, the sample is analyzed by the Mira Analyzer, and the data is automatically synced using Bluetooth LE wireless connectivity provided by the Nordic SoC to the iOS- and Android-compatible Mira Fertility app on the user’s Bluetooth 4.0 (or later) smartphone. The partner app then uses AI-based analysis to learn the unique hormone levels and patterns of the user. From the app display, the user can receive accurate fertility hormone data, monitor hormone patterns, and view precise, personalized ovulation predictions, as well as accurate insights into their fertility window to enhance the prospects of conception. Users can also enter and store a full suite of additional fertility tracking data such as intercourse dates, cervical mucus, cervical anatomy, basal body temperature, and period data.

According to Quanovate, Mira is the only FDA-, CE-, and CFDA-registered and certified, at-home diagnostic device with the capability to cover every stage of women’s health testing from fertility, pregnancy, fetal health, ovarian reserve, and menopause tracking.

 

Nordic’s nRF52832 multiprotocol SoC combines an 64MHz, 32-bit Arm® Cortex® M4F processor with a 2.4GHz multiprotocol radio (supporting Bluetooth 5, ANT™, and proprietary 2.4GHz RF protocol software) featuring -96-dB RX sensitivity, with 512kB Flash memory and 64kB RAM. The nRF52832 is supplied with Nordic’s S132 SoftDevice, a Bluetooth 5-certifed RF software protocol stack for building advanced Bluetooth LE applications. Nordic’s unique software architecture provides a clear separation between the RF protocol software and Quanovate’s application code, simplifying the development and testing process and ensuring the SoftDevice doesn’t become corrupted when developing, compiling, testing, and verifying application code. The S132 SoftDevice features Central, Peripheral, Broadcaster and Observer Bluetooth LE roles, supports up to twenty connections, and enables concurrent role operation.

 

Mira employs a 600 mAh Li-ion polymer rechargeable battery to provide battery life for more than 30 functional cycles in full load working mode, and more than 30 days in Bluetooth LE sleep mode, thanks in part to the low power and low sleep-current capabilities of the Nordic SoC. The nRF52832 SoC has been engineered to minimize power consumption with features such as the 2.4GHz radio’s 5.5mA peak RX/TX currents and a fully-automatic power management system that reduces power consumption by up to 80 percent compared with Nordic’s nRF51 Series SoCs. The result is a Bluetooth LE solution which offers 58 CoreMark/mA, up to twice as power efficient as competing devices.

 

“The powerful Arm CPU capability, large memory capacity, radio sensitivity, and power consumption were all key factors in Quanovate’s decision to use Nordic’s nRF52832 SoC in our Mira device,” says Sylvia Kang, co-founder and CEO of Quanovate. “The separation between Nordic’s SoftDevice and our own application code, as well as the technical information and reference designed provided by Nordic were particularly advantageous during the development process.”