Floating Micro-Stimulators for Neural Prosthetics

描述（由申请人提供）：数十年来，人们一直在研究外周和中枢神经系统的电激活用于治疗神经疾病，许多器械已经成功进入临床阶段。髋关节假体、用于脊髓损伤的膀胱和肠道控制的骶根刺激以及癫痫的迷走神经刺激是每年植入数千名患者的此类设备的一些众所周知的例子。已经阻止或以其他方式阻碍许多其他神经假体装置的实施的主要障碍是刺激电极与神经组织的机械失配以及导致组织创伤的线连接的栓系。非常需要这样的电刺激器，其是可远程控制的，没有互连并且足够小，使得以最小的神经组织替换来实现良好的空间选择性。我们建议开发非常小（约200微米）的光伏元件，可以植入到脊髓或大脑皮层和激活从硬膜外通过神经组织使用近红外激光束。这些浮动光激活微电刺激器（FLAMES）的几何形状和界面特性将进行优化，以最大限度地将能量转移到组织中，同时最大限度地减小器械尺寸。将设计各种尺寸的器械，以满足不同神经刺激应用的要求。将在培养基（琼脂/生理盐水）和体内（大鼠）中测试优化FLAMES的刺激特性。未来的设计将包括先进版本的火焰，调整为不同波长的光选择性激活。光通信的硅技术已经得到了广泛的开发和研究，并且可以通过合理的研究量进行修改以用于神经刺激。一些直接应用包括但不限于用于替代这些感觉的视觉和听觉皮层刺激，以及用于脊髓损伤中的膀胱控制和运动的腰骶髓的微刺激。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Electrical activation of the peripheral and central nervous system has been investigated for treatment of neural disorders for many decades and a number of devices have already moved into the clinical phase with success. Cochlear prostheses, sacral root stimulation for bladder and bowel control in spinal cord injury, and vagus nerve stimulation in epilepsy are some of the well-known examples of such devices that are being implanted in thousands of patients every year. A major obstacle that has been preventing or otherwise impeding the implementation of many other neural prosthetic devices is the mechanical mismatch of the stimulation electrodes with the neural tissue and the tethering of the wire connections that result in tissue trauma. Electrical stimulators that are remotely controllable with no interconnects and sufficiently small so that a good spatial selectivity is achieved with minimal replacement of the neural tissue are greatly needed. We propose to develop very small (approximately 200 um) photovoltaic elements that can be implanted into the spinal cord or the brain cortex and activated from outside the dura mater through the neural tissue using near infrared laser beams. The geometry and the interface properties of these floating light activated micro electrical stimulators (FLAMES) will be optimized for maximum transfer of energy into the tissue while minimizing the device size. Devices with various sizes will be designed to meet the requirements of different neural stimulation applications. The stimulation properties of the optimized FLAMES will be tested in medium (agar/saline) and in vivo (rat). Future designs will include advanced versions of the FLAMES that are tuned for different wavelengths of light for selective activation. The silicon technology of optical communication has already been developed and studied extensively and can be modified for neural stimulation with reasonable amount of research. Some of the immediate applications include but not limited to visual and auditory cortex stimulation for substitution of these senses, and micro-stimulation of the lumbo-sacral cord for bladder control and locomotion in spinal cord injury.