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Breakfast seminar highlighted new technology for Home-based Hormone Diagnostics

On Thursday 28 May, researchers, students and guests gathered at the Digital Futures hub for a well-attended breakfast seminar on the future of home-based hormone diagnostics. The event marked the International Day for Menstrual Health and focused on how emerging technologies can help close the global gender health gap.

The seminar, titled New Technology for Home-Based Hormone Diagnostics, featured Professor Carlota Canalias Gomez, physicist and photonics researcher at KTH and one of the scientists behind the new InspireLab-funded project Home-based Hormone Diagnostics.

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Breakfast was served before the seminar opened with welcoming remarks from KTH President Anders Söderholm, who highlighted the importance of research centres such as InspireLab and the growing significance of research addressing gender equality – connecting it to KTH:s vision of taking the lead for a sustainable society. InspireLab Centre Director Pia Höök also introduced InspireLab and its mission to support transformative research initiatives.

“At InspireLab, we believe that technology development must include perspectives and needs that have historically been neglected. Research like this shows how engineering and digital innovation can contribute to real societal change,” said Pia Höök.

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A woman stands next to a screen displaying statistics about gender equality, severe car crash injuries, and endometriosis. The screen is titled Did You Know? and highlights key figures in red boxes.
A woman in a suit stands and speaks in front of a screen displaying a list of InspireLab Projects to an audience, with project titles including AI for gender-based violence detection and hormone diagnostics.
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She also highlighted that, at the current pace of change and according to the WEF Global Gender Gap Report 2025, the world will achieve gender equality in 123 years. She noted that women are almost twice as likely as men to sustain severe injuries in car crashes and that an estimated 10 percent of women suffer from endometriosis.

“Women don’t need more sympathy. We need more engineering,” stated Carlota Canalias Gomez.

During the presentation, she described how the project aims to make hormone levels measurable in everyday life through a simple and affordable home urine test. By combining fibre optics, spectroscopy and AI, the system is designed to measure six key hormones — LH, FSH, oestrogen, progesterone, cortisol and serotonin — with results analysed via a mobile phone.

A person stands in front of a screen giving a presentation. The slide reads, Women don’t need more sympathy. We need more engineering. A laptop sits on a small stand nearby. The setting appears to be an indoor meeting room.
A group of people sits in a modern conference room, listening to three speakers at the front near a screen that displays “Thank you.” The room has wood-panelled walls and warm lighting.
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People sit facing a screen in a modern conference room, watching three presenters at the front. The screen displays a Thank you slide, and the atmosphere appears to be that of a workshop or seminar.
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The goal is to empower individuals to better understand their hormonal health while also generating new knowledge in a field that has long been under-researched. Improving menstrual and hormonal health is considered an important step towards reducing the global gender health gap, with major implications not only for wellbeing but also for society and the economy.

Although still in its early stages, the project has already attracted significant external interest. Participants at the seminar expressed strong engagement throughout the session, which concluded with lively discussions and an appreciated Q&A session.

The breakfast seminar was organised as a collaboration between InspireLab and Digital Futures and co-sponsored by Digital Futures.

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A clear glass vase with yellow flowers sits on a wooden table next to platters of assorted sandwiches with lettuce, cheese, and tomato, and a plate of fresh fruit including pears, plums, and apples.
A man in a suit pours coffee at a round wooden table with snacks and drinks, while four other people stand and talk near a window in a modern, bright office space.

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