Manchester students win international awards for their ‘AlcoPatch’

It detects alcohol in your sweat


Six Manchester students have won an award for creating an patch that can tell if users are over the alcohol driving limit the morning after a night out.

The AlcoPatch was created this summer and won a gold medal at the iGEM International world championship last month in Boston. It detects alcohol in sweat and changes colour dependant on the amount of alcohol found in the sweat.

The inventors believe that the AlcoPatch will be could be as an “affordable personal intoxication awareness tool”. Professor Eriko Takano of the University of Manchester’s Institute of Biotechnology (MIB) said: “Throughout the process we didn’t just care about genes and microbes, but also were thinking hard about the impact of their science on the wider world.”

The team was made up of six biologists, two engineers, one mathematician and one linguistics student, supervised by Professors Eriko Takano and Rainer Breitling.

They were fortunate enough to secure financial support from the Manchester Enterprise Centre and the industrial biotechnology networks IBCarb, BioProNET and the Tokyo Chemical Industry Uk ltd. Enabling the students to compete against 300 teams in Boston last month.

The team won gold as well as an award for “Best Computational Model” and were also shortlisted for the “Best educational and Public Engagement” award.