1 Keywords- neonate, incubator, infant monitoring, LabVIEW. Abstract— The aim of this project was to develop a prototype model of a neonatal incubator, which is indigenously developed keeping in mind the particular challenges faced by rural and urban government hospitals in India, using the superior prototyping abilities of LabVIEW. The incubator consists of a single walled isolette with temperature regulation system inside the isolette that includes a heater/cooler arrangement ideal for the varied temperatures of the Indian subcontinent so that the air inside is maintained at a constant 37 o C. This is the unique feature of our design. In India, summer temperatures can reach well above 45 o C and infants are vulnerable to heat stress. In rural areas, where NICUs are not air-conditioned, such an incubator with a cooling arrangement can help save lives. Also, the use of hypothermia therapy for treatment of neonates with brain disorders is gaining importance due to its proved effectiveness. The infant’s body temperature is measured with both skin and rectal probes with an alarm in case of hypothermia and hyperthermia. The system is also equipped to measure the infant’s respiration rate and heart rate using a microphone. Infant apnea is a preventable cause of death in neonates, and hence the need to monitor the infant’s respiration as well as heart rate and give an alarm in case of apneatic condition as well as in case of irregular breathing patterns. A humidity monitoring module ensures that the humidity of the air inside the isolette is constantly monitored. I. INTRODUCTION RETERM birth is a major cause of death all over the world and is defined as those infants born after 32 weeks of gestation calculated from the first day of the woman’s last period. Complications of preterm birth are the largest contributor to neonatal deaths and responsible for 35% of the world’s 3.1 million deaths. In many low income countries, only 30% of infants born between 28-32 weeks survive, almost all those born less than 28 weeks of gestation die within the first few days of life. South Asia and sub-saharan Africa account for almost two thirds of the world’s preterm babies and over three-fourths of the world’s newborn deaths due to preterm complications[1]. India, China, Nigeria, Pakistan and Indonesia rank among the top 5 countries in the world with the highest number of preterm births in 2010 with India accounting for 23.6% of the global total of preterm births[2]. According to Costello et al, the leading causes for neonatal mortality in developing countries are birth asphyxia, complications arising due to low birth weight, tetanus and other bacterial infections, and jaundice, though allocation of cause of death during this period can be as difficult as the assignment of mortality by verbal post-mortem in older age groups[3]. Infant mortality rates in developing countries can mostly be attributed to poor post‐birth care, which is critical to the survival of preterm or critically ill neonates who need to be placed in a carefully controlled thermally regulated environment where their vital parameters are constantly monitored. Priority, evidence based actions for neonatal survival that can be implemented include thermal care, feeding support and infection prevention; neonatal resuscitation; Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC) and essential care for babies with complications, according to the WHO global action report on preterm birth[1]. The report further mentions the need for developing effective technologies for incubator care with basic temperature control, temperature monitoring, provision for resuscitation and apnea alarm. II. PROTOTYPE DESIGN A. System Overview The system diagram of the neonatal incubator built includes modules for temperature control using Thermoelectric Heating/ Cooling systems (Peltier plate), temperature monitoring which measures the skin temperature using skin probe and core temperature measurement using rectal probe, humidity sensing which includes both ambient humidity and Prototype of a Neonatal Incubator using LabVIEW Neha Verma Department of Biomedical Engineering Thadomal Shahani Engineering College Mumbai, India Gauri Shukla Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering Thadomal Shahani Engineering College Mumbai, India Lavina Utamani Department of Biomedical Engineering Thadomal Shahani Engineering College Mumbai, India P