HCC: Small: Collaborative Research: Packaging Optimization for Next-Generation Implantable Human-Computer Interface Devices

HCC：小型：协作研究：下一代植入式人机接口设备的封装优化

• 批准号: 1117093
• 负责人: John Wyatt
• 金额: $ 37.29万
• 依托单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-08-01 至 2014-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1117093&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: HCC; Small; Collaborative; Research; Packaging

This project represents an ongoing collaboration between teams at two institutions. As people live longer, blindness caused by degenerative diseases of the retina such as macular degeneration or retinitis pigmentosa is today a major disability among the aging in the developed world. These types of "neural" blindness cannot currently be medically treated in any satisfactory manner. There is now compelling experimental evidence in humans that even when such diseases cause a loss of photoreceptors (i.e., rod and cone cells in the retina), electrical stimulation of the remaining retinal neurons that survive this loss can be used to bypass the damaged tissue and deliver visual information to the brain. This is essentially the same concept that supported the development of the cochlear prosthesis, which has been a fabulous success, restoring hearing to many tens of thousands of deaf patients. The PIs and their respective teams have been working for over 20 years toward the goal of developing a retinal prosthesis to restore truly useful vision to patients in an analogous manner. With prior funding from a number of agencies including NSF, they have created enabling technology for a miniaturized high-density implantable wirelessly-driven neuro-prosthesis package with over 200 individually-addressable channels, which is over three times the inputs and outputs in any current commercially available neurostimulator. The field's ability to create complex integrated circuitry for neurostimulation and/or recording has outpaced the development of long-term implantable packaging, microelectrode array, and assembly technology. If optimized, those technologies would make possible new devices that interface with hundreds of neural tissue sites simultaneously. This is the PI's aim in the current project. The funding will complement existing grants to the PIs and their collaborators, and will allow them to complete development of a new 200+ channel co-fired ceramic signal feed-through disc, to optimize the micro-fabrication process for high-density microelectrode arrays that interface with neural tissue, and to improve the bonding and interconnection processes required to assemble the implant package. Broader Impacts: The 200+ channel wirelessly-driven implant that will constitute the primary project outcome will have over three times the number of individually-addressable stimulating electrodes now available from any group. This funding will further allow the PI to ready devices for later pre-clinical testing (with anticipated follow-on support from the VA). Project results will be widely disseminated in publications, and by distributing sample devices within the rehabilitation R&D community. The device which is the focus of this project will also be useful in a myriad other future chronically implantable prosthetics, palliative devices, and human-computer interface devices.

这个项目代表了两个机构的团队之间正在进行的合作。随着人们寿命的延长，由视网膜退行性疾病引起的失明，如黄斑变性或视网膜色素变性，是当今发达国家老龄化中的一项主要残疾。这些类型的“神经性”失明目前还不能以任何令人满意的方式进行医学治疗。现在有令人信服的人类实验证据表明，即使这种疾病导致光感受器(即视网膜中的视杆细胞和视锥细胞)的丧失，对在这种丧失中幸存下来的剩余视网膜神经元的电刺激可以用来绕过受损组织，向大脑传递视觉信息。这基本上是支持人工耳蜗术发展的相同概念，人工耳蜗术取得了惊人的成功，使数万名聋人恢复了听力。20多年来，PI和他们各自的团队一直在努力实现开发视网膜假体的目标，以类似的方式恢复患者真正有用的视力。在包括NSF在内的多个机构的事先资助下，他们已经为一种微型高密度可植入无线驱动神经假体组件创造了使能技术，该组件具有200多个可单独寻址的通道，是目前任何商业神经刺激器的输入和输出的三倍多。该领域为神经刺激和/或记录创造复杂集成电路的能力已经超过了长期植入式包装、微电极阵列和组装技术的发展。如果进行优化，这些技术将使同时与数百个神经组织部位接口的新设备成为可能。这是PI在当前项目中的目标。这笔资金将补充对PI及其合作者的现有赠款，并将使他们能够完成新的200+通道共烧陶瓷信号馈通光盘的开发，优化与神经组织对接的高密度微电极阵列的微制造工艺，并改进组装植入组件所需的接合和互连工艺。更广泛的影响：200+通道无线驱动植入物将构成主要项目成果，其可单独寻址的刺激电极数量将是目前任何组可用电极数量的三倍以上。这笔资金将进一步允许PI为稍后的临床前测试做好设备准备(预计退伍军人管理局将提供后续支持)。项目成果将在出版物中广泛传播，并通过在康复研发社区内分发样本设备来传播。该设备是该项目的重点，也将用于未来无数其他可长期植入的假肢、姑息设备和人机界面设备。