Feasibility study on a prototype of vestibular implant using MEMS gyroscopes

This paper presents a feasibility study on an MEMS-based implantable vestibular prosthesis. Our end-goal is to design a prosthesis that will replace the function of the damaged vestibular end-organ by providing an MEMS chip that will accurately sense, extract, and transmit 3-dimensional motion information for people who have permanently lost peripheral vestibular function. The prosthesis prototype includes orthogonal triads of accelerometers and gyroscopes on-a-single fingernail sized chip. Based on physiological data on perceptual thresholds of linear acceleration and angular velocity in humans, we conclude that the MEMS technology is a viable candidate for such an implant. Functional architecture for the vestibular prosthesis is introduced.