Students have been working on the development of wearable hydration sensors at the startup company RooSense. The goal of the company is to develop a lightweight wearable sensor that enables the user to know their hydration level, thus elevating their performance goals. To measure the hydration of the wearer, the sodium and other salt ions are collected from the user’s sweat as they exercise. This sweat is analyzed as it is collected to give the user an exact level of hydration, so they know how much fluids they need. The production of this ion sensor requires numerous steps and iteration upon the analysis of results. The process of the makeup of sensors starts with electrospinning a carbon fiber mat in an enclosed chamber in a lab. Once the mats are electrospun, quality control tests are run including tensile testing to show the durability of the sensors and sensor response testing is completed to show how the sensor responds to exposure to sodium ions so that a calibration curve can be created for use in the final sensors. When an athlete wears the sensor the sodium ions in the sweat are measured which helps the athlete better understand their hydration level
