A flexible fish-bone-shaped neural probe strengthened by biodegradable silk coating for enhanced biocompatibility

Author

Wu, Fan ; Im, Maesoon ; Yoon, Euisik

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

fYear

2011

fDate

5-9 June 2011

Firstpage

966

Lastpage

969

Abstract

This paper reports a fish-bone-shaped polyimide neural probe for chronic recording applications. This unique design aims to minimize tissue reaction by having flexible substrate, small dimensions, large separation distance between electrodes and the probe shank, as well as large substrate openings. A biodegradable silk polymer is coated around the polyimide structure to provide temporary mechanical strength during insertion. The time required for the complete degradation of silk can be controlled within the range of 30 minutes to 25 hours by water annealing process. In-vitro insertion of the fabricated silk-coated probe into brain tissue has been successfully demonstrated.

Keywords

annealing; bioMEMS; biodegradable materials; biological tissues; biomedical electrodes; biomedical materials; brain; mechanical strength; microfabrication; neurophysiology; polymer films; biocompatibility; biodegradable silk coating; brain tissue; chronic recording applications; degradation; electrodes; flexible fish-bone-shaped neural probe; flexible substrate; in-vitro insertion; mechanical strength; polyimide structure; polymer; probe shank; separation distance; time 0.5 h to 25 h; tissue reaction; water annealing process; Coatings; Degradation; Electrodes; Immune system; Polyimides; Probes; Neural probe; biocompatibility; polyimide; silk;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Solid-State Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems Conference (TRANSDUCERS), 2011 16th International

Conference_Location

Beijing

ISSN

Pending

Print_ISBN

978-1-4577-0157-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/TRANSDUCERS.2011.5969356

Filename

5969356