New BIA applications

The applications of real time BIA are limitless. The biological conductive changes when expressed as electrical resistance and reactance over time are real and quantitative as fluids, nutrients and waste migrate across cell membranes.

A simple example is measuring a fresh Pickerel fish from lake Erie that is not more than 24 hours old after it was caught. The cell membranes break down rapidly and can be observed in the reactance values. The resistance value declines slightly because there are few cells in its path. Fresh Fish plot

Click on the graph (plot) for a pdf image.

Applications of BIA

Historically, the applications of Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA) have been focused on human body composition. Although peer reviewed literature describes a wide variety of various disease or population specific applications, the migration of BIA technology from research to clinical applications has been slow. One possible cause may be the fact that the potential usefulness of BIA is so widespread and involves so many different medical specialties. Consequently, development of validated applications and the necessary FDA clearances will take time. It is interesting to note that "From 2000 to 2006, the number of papers cited in Medline and containing the keywords 'bio-impedance' or 'impedance tomography' increased by 56%."[1] It is obvious that interest in BIA continues to grow.

The purpose of this section of our website is to provide descriptions of current applications of BIA. These descriptions are drawn from a number of sources, but we maintain emphasis on peer-reviewed literature.

  • Case Studies

    Several of our customers have been kind enough to write about how BIA affects their work. You can read some of their write-ups here.

  • Peer-Reviewed Papers

    We also have a collection of published, peer-reviewed journal articles that discuss different uses of BIA in humans, plants, and animals.

  • Real time bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA)

    The essays in this section discuss the science of BIA and impedance plethysmography and their application in collecting and interpreting real-time data.

  • General documentation on BIA and/or body composition.

    Documentation which does not fall into one of the above categories can be found here. You would expect to find body composition average data here.

[1] Richard H Bayford et al 2008 Physiol. Meas. 29