Temperature sensor for medical application

Abstract

A small sized temperature sensor for measuring temperatures in the body and for measuring temperatures in an extracorporeal blood circulation circuit, wherein the possibility of electrical shock and the cost are reduced, while resolution and reliability are increased. The temperature sensor comprises a source of light, an optical fiber to receive light from the light source at one end of the optical fiber, a transducer positioned near the other end of the optical fiber, a reflection means for reflecting the irradiated light, and an arithmetic processing unit which calculates temperature based upon the reflected light measured. The transducer is made up of at least two polymers that have different temperature dependencies of refractive index and form a microphase separation structure, wherein the polymers are cured products made from a cationically polymerizable compound having epoxy groups and a radically polymerizable compound having radically unsaturated groups.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.