The new work in Science Translational Medicine provides a wide range of peer-reviewed data demonstrating that grids with 1,024 or 2,048 sensors can be used to reliably record and process electrical signals directly from the surface of the brain in both humans and rats.
Recording brain activity from grids of sensors placed directly on the surface of the brain – electrocorticography (ECoG) – is already in common use as a tool by surgeons performing procedures to remove brain tumors and treat epilepsy in people who do not respond to drugs or other treatments. Credit: Angelique Paulk, Ahmed Raslan, Daniel Cleary, Youngbin Tchoe, and Shadi Dayeh Next-generation electrocorticography Video plays twice, once with text labels and once with just a clean animation. The team of engineers, surgeons and medical researchers hails from UC San Diego Massachusetts General Hospital and Oregon Health & Science University.Īnimation illustrates use cases of the high-resolution brain sensors described in the Science Translational Medicine paper titled, “Human brain mapping with multithousand-channel PtNRGrids resolves spatiotemporal dynamics” published on January 19, 2022. The project is led by electrical engineering professor Shadi Dayeh at the University of California San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. The technology also holds potential for permanent implantation to improve the quality of life of people who live with paralysis or other neurodegenerative diseases that can be treated with electrical stimulation such as in Parkinson’s disease, essential tremor, and the neurological movement disorder called dystonia. Longer term, the team is working on wireless versions of these high resolution ECoG grids that could be used for up to 30 days of brain monitoring for people with intractable epilepsy. Access to this highly detailed perspective on which specific areas of the tissue at the brain’s surface, or cerebral cortex, are active, and when, could provide better guidance for planning surgeries to remove brain tumors and surgically treat drug-resistant epilepsy. These thin, pliable grids of ECoG sensors, if approved for clinical use, would offer surgeons brain-signal information directly from the surface of the brain’s cortex in 100 times higher resolution than what is available today. The paper was published by the journal Science Translational Medicine on Janu. The new brain sensors feature densely packed grids of either 1,024 or 2,048 embedded electrocorticography (ECoG) sensors. High-resolution recordings of electrical signals from the surface of the brain could improve surgeons’ ability to remove brain tumors and treat epilepsy, and could open up new possibilities for medium- and longer- term brain-computer interfaces.Ī team of engineers, surgeons, and medical researchers has published data from both humans and rats demonstrating that a new array of brain sensors can record electrical signals directly from the surface of the human brain in record-breaking detail. Credit: David Baillot / UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering The new brain sensors feature thin, flexible, and densely packed grids of either 1,024 or 2,048 embedded electrocorticography (ECoG) sensors.
A new array of brain sensors can record electrical signals directly from the surface of the human brain in record-breaking detail.