Plenary 1: Applications & Markets I

Minimally Invasive, Wireless Neural Interfaces
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
8:45 AM - 9:10 AM

Clinically viable and minimally invasive neural interfaces stand to revolutionize disease care for patients of neurological conditions. For example, recently there has been an explosion of research in Brain-Machine Interfaces (BMI) that has shown incredible results in using electronic signals from the motor cortex of the brain to control artificial limbs, providing hope for patients with paralysis. Yet, a major impediment to both the study of motor disorders as well as clinical translation of such technology is that state-of-the-art neural interfaces are large, wired and require open-skull operation, which leave the patients at risk of infection and unable to move. Future, less invasive interfaces with increased numbers of electrodes, computation and learning, and wireless connectivity will enable advanced prosthetics, disease control and completely new user-computer interfaces. In this talk, I will discuss how emerging devices that combine advanced electronic design with flexible electronics can improve functionality while greatly reducing size, infection risk and surgical complications, enabling a lifetime of safe chronic use.