Graphene optoelectronic biointerfaces for enabling optical cardiac pacemaking

联系PD/PI：Efimov，Igor 项目总结 心律失常是一种危及生命的疾病，影响着数百万患者的生活质量， 预计在老龄化人口中，心律失常患者的数量将会增加。50多年来， 心脏起搏器已经被植入患者的心脏，以传递电刺激来诱导 心脏以理想的频率收缩。电子起搏器经历了戏剧性的改进 但它们的一些固有性质与它们的工作方式的电学性质有关 总是会产生一些问题，这些问题不能通过进一步的改进来克服。这些问题包括 电极-组织界面上的电化学过程造成的组织疤痕，以及不相容 还有一长串的医疗程序、机场安检设备和一些家用电器。 我们的项目旨在开发一种使用光学而不是电子的替代心脏起搏器 刺激。该设备将得到一种新的石墨烯介导的光学刺激技术的帮助，该技术 依靠石墨烯独特的光电特性将光转化为电能，并诱导 心肌细胞膜上电场的变化。该技术与一种 植入式无线小型化LED系统有望为新一代 心脏起搏器。 该可行性项目代表了一项中等风险/高回报的研究，提供了革命性的 纳米技术驱动的生物工程解决方案有望显著改善现有医疗 用于纠正心律失常的装置。这种方法还可以扩展到 心脏科。 第6页 项目摘要/摘要

Contact PD/PI: Efimov, Igor PROJECT SUMMARY Arrhythmia is a life-threatening condition that impacts the quality of life of millions of patients, and the number of arrhythmia patients is expected to increase in the aging population. For over 50 years, cardiac pacemakers have been implanted into patients' hearts to deliver electrical stimuli to induce the heart contractions at the desired rate. Electrical pacemakers underwent dramatic improvements over the years, but some of their inherent properties related to the electrical nature of their modus of operandi will always create problems that cannot be overcome by further improvements. Among these problems are tissue scarring due to electrochemical processes at the electrode-tissue interface, and the incompatibility with the long list of medical procedures, airport security equipment, and some home appliances. Our project aims to develop an alternative cardiac pacemaker using optical rather than electrical stimulation. This device will be aided by a novel graphene-mediated optical stimulation technology that relies on unique optoelectronic properties of graphene to convert light into electricity and induce the changes in the electrical field across the cardiac cell membrane. This technology combined with an implantable wireless miniaturized LED system is expected to lay the foundation for the new generation of cardiac pacemakers. This feasibility project represents a medium risk / high reward study offering a revolutionary nanotechnology-driven bioengineering solution that is expected to significantly improve existing medical devices for correcting the abnormal heart rhythm. This approach could also be extended beyond cardiology. Page 6 Project Summary/Abstract