KDI: A wireless ECoG recording platform with impedance spectroscopy, electrical stimulation and real-time, lossless data compression.

A power-efficient modular wireless platform has been designed for prototyping and pre-clinical evaluations of neural recording implants. This Kit for Designing Implants (KDI) is separated in function specific modules of 34×34mm which can be assembled as needed. This paper presents the design of new modules for this existing wireless KDI platform. These modules cover the functionalities of electrical stimulation for BCI neurofeedback, impedance spectroscopy for monitoring tissue reaction around implanted electrodes and a real-time lossless data compression algorithm for ECoG signals. This algorithm has been implemented using two different hardware solutions and its performances compared. The design and evaluation of these modules are a first step towards the inclusion of these functionalities into the next generation of WIMAGINE(®) implants.

KDI: a wireless power-efficient modular platform for pre-clinical evaluation of implantable neural recording designs.

This paper presents a power-efficient modular wireless platform which has been designed for prototyping and pre-clinical evaluations of neural recording implants. This Kit for Designing Implants (KDI) is separated in function specific modules of 34×34mm which can be assembled as needed. Five modules have been designed and optimized for ultra-low power consumption and a protective casing has been designed for pre-clinical trials. Two different wireless modules have been compared and the KDI performances have been evaluated in terms of modularity, wireless throughput and power consumption.

Characterisation of the acoustic cavitation cloud by two laser techniques.

An experimental investigation of the size and volumetric concentration of acoustic cavitation bubbles is presented. The cavitation bubble cloud is generated at 20 kHz by an immersed horn in a rectangular glass vessel containing bi-distilled water. Two laser techniques, laser diffraction and phase Doppler interferometry, are implemented and compared. These two techniques are based on different measuring principles. The laser diffraction technique analyses the light pattern scattered by the bubbles along a line-of-sight of the experimental vessel (spatial average). The phase Doppler technique is based on the analysis of the light scattered from single bubbles passing through a set of interference fringes formed by the intersection of two laser beams: bubble size and velocity distributions are extracted from a great number of single-bubble events (local and temporal average) but only size distributions are discussed here. Difficulties arising in the application of the laser diffraction technique are discussed: in particular, the fact that the acoustic wave disturbs the light scattering patterns even when there are no cavitation bubbles along the measurement volume. As a consequence, a procedure has been developed to correct the raw data in order to get a significant bubble size distribution. After this data treatment has been applied the results from the two measurement techniques show good agreement. Under the emitter surface, the Sauter mean diameter D(3, 2) is approximately 10 microm by phase Doppler measurement and 7.5 microm by laser diffraction measurement at 179 W. Note that the mean measured diameter is much smaller than the resonance diameter predicted by the linear theory (about 280 microm). The influence of the acoustic power is investigated. Axial and radial profiles of mean bubble diameters and void fraction are also presented.