Description
- Abstract:
- Future brain-computer interfaces will require technologies that enable efficient, reliable and high-speed transmission of broadband multichannel neural data out of the brain with minimal number of transmission channels. Optical telecommunication which is the dominant technology for data/information transmission today provides such a technology due to its wide bandwidth, low signal attenuation and lack of crosstalk regardless of the length of its path, and thus could be utilized in neural recording systems requiring fast transmission and processing of big data sets. The main concept of my research is to develop a fiber optic based implantable multichannel neural recording system as a brain-computer interface. Adopting advantages of optical communication, here I present a concept of multichannel neural recording device, which utilizes infrared (IR) fiber optics for dual purpose of powering active electronic circuits with a single optical fiber and extracting of broadband multichannel neural data with another. The suggested multichannel neural recording system was implemented and optimized as a micro-scale device, and used in a rat model for chronic long term intracortical recordings. In a prototype for small animal model, the microelectronic device architecture consisted of (i) an implantable ‘front-end’ carried an ultra-low power 16- channel preamplifier and a multiplexer chip integrated directly onto a 4x4 cortical microelectrode array to access neural activity, and (ii) an ultralight ‘back-end’ housing an analog-to-digital converter, a low power digital controller chip, an infrared (IR) photovoltaic device and an IR micro-laser, the latter to convert multiplexed multichannel neural data to a stream of IR pulses. After confirming its chronic performance by recording motor cortical activity in awake, freely behaving rats, the device was utilized to study behavior-dependent activity dynamics in the motor cortices of rats trained to perform a lever-pressing task. These studies showed that neural activity in the motor cortex had distinct single-unit and population dynamics corresponding to different phases of behavior during the task performance. As a summary, this thesis work demonstrated a new fiber-optic-based neural recording device as a broadband brain-computer interface. While the device performance was shown in a small animal model, it could be easily adopted to large animal models for future studies.
- Notes:
- Thesis (Ph.D. -- Brown University (2014)
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Citation
Park, Sunmee,
"Fiber Optic Prosthesis"
(2014).
Biomedical Engineering Theses and Dissertations.
Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library.
https://doi.org/10.7301/Z0J101HH
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Biomedical Engineering Theses and Dissertations
Theses and Dissertations for the Biomedical Engineering department....