An Electrode Array Net for Brain Slice Studies

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It is now possible to make microelectrode arrays capable of stimulating and recording from many neurons at intervals approaching the dimensions of the neurons themselves. The arrays proposed offer an order of magnitude increase in observational power over conventional techniques, with the promise of hundredfold improvement in the future. The technology is basic to the study of neural populations just as the microelectrode is basic to the study of single cells, and will provide neurobiological systems. Similarly, these tools are critical to the development of human neural protheses which must have multidimensional interaction with various neural subsystems. The primary goal of this research is to develop the planar electrode array as a stimulation and recording tool for research with the brain slice preparation. Dr. Bruce Wheeler has successfully applied a planar microelectrode array to the hippocampal brain slice preparation demonstrating that the array makes it possible to record from and stimulate a significant fraction of the slice at 200 micro meter intervals simultaneously or in an arbitrary pattern in time and space. Many experiments currently done with one or two electrodes can be repeated with much greater observational power to survey the possible the state of the different slice subregions. The number of channels is vastly greater than that possible with microdrives or manipulators. The efficiency of the experiment is multiplied b the increase in recorded data and the increase in the number of stimulus points, while the experimenter's efficiency is aided by the fact that all electrodes ate positioned merely by placing the slice on top of the array. A technical advantage of the array does not occupy any of the restricted space above the slice, this leaving room for additional electrodes and probes to stimulate, record, measure ion concentrations, and administer drugs. Still, the power of the array lies in its ability to give the experimenter a two dimensional image of slice activity and the ability to control or stimulate it as a system.