Putting Electronics in the Brain Is moving things with your mind science fiction or science..?

Putting Electronics in the Brain Is moving things with your mind science fiction or science..?Rikky MullerBerkeley Wireless Research CenterBEARS Conference 2012Science Fiction

Science fiction has long been fascinated by tapping into the brain to control devices, enhance our minds, or even create other selves. Although some of these applications seem far fetched today we are working on neural implants for some important clinical applications.2

US STATISTICS

Spinal Cord Injury: 250k; 11k/yr56% between 16 and 47, 30% quadriplegicTraumatic Brain Injury: 5.3MAmputees: 400kStroke: 6.5MALS/Locked-in Syndrome: 30kEpilepsy: 3MParkinsons: 1MClinical Depression: 1MOCD: 28 kWho Could Use a Neural Interface?Goal: To restore mobility, communication to > 17M people/yearImagine you get into a car accident and suffer a catastrophic spinal cord injury of your C4 vertebra. Today in terms of mobility and autonimity you have very few options, and chances are youll be dependent on another person just to perform daily tasks. Brain-machine interfaces offer the hope of restoring mobility and communications not just to patients of spinal cord injury but to patients of traumatic brain injury, amputees, stroke and many other debilitating neurological conditions.3Brain-Machine Interface

[Nicolelis, Nature 01]Brain-Machine Interface

What are they not showing us?[Velliste et al, Nature 2008]

Past and Future InterfacesTodays DevicesTomorrows Devices

[Hochberg, Nature 2006]

The Vision

[Doerner, 2010]

2mm66Right the tools used are bulky and require open-skull operation leaving the patient at risk of infection and unable to move. Ultimately we want to transition these tools to be less invasive, integrating functionality into a single chip with electrodes which is powered remotely through RF. To the right are two such devices that we have been developing at BWRC which include some of the smallest and lowest power wireless sensor nodes ever developed. The Ultimate goal is to make these devices so minimally invasive (with a small footprint an that a patient can have them implanted in their head for their entire lifetime. If youre interested in finding out more of the technical details I invite you to come see our posters along with many others at the BWRC open house.

Berkeley Wireless Research Center250 SUTARDJA-DAI HALL

Collaborators: WIFO Wireless Foundations CenterBSAC Berkeley Sensor & Actuator CenterCITRIS Environmental EngineeringCNEP Center for Neural Engineering & ProsthesesOf course were not only working on neural interfaces. BWRC is comprised of 6 research groups working on projects from energy scavenging to ultra-high frequency portable imaging.7