Neural Implant podcast - the people behind Brain-Machine Interface revolutions

This podcast's purpose is to bring together the field of neuroprosthetics / brain machine interfaces / brain implants in an understandable conversation about the current topics and breakthroughs. We hope to complement scientific papers on new neural research in an easy, digestable way. Innovators and professionals can share thoughts or ideas to facilitate 'idea sex' to make the field of brain implants a smaller and more personal space.

Christine Schmidt: Pioneering Regenerative Neural Tissue Engineering 04/15/2024

Bioel 2024 Conference panel with Drs Jon Viventi, Tracy Cui, Ellis Meng, and Ivan Minev 04/08/2024

Bioel 2024 Conference panel with Drs Jon Viventi, Tracy Cui, Ellis Meng, and Ivan Minev Welcome to the Neural Implant Podcast! In this episode, the podcast team presents a live panel recording from the Bio L Conference at the International Winter School on Bioelectronics in Austria in March 2024. Hosted by Ladan, the panel discusses various types of neural implants with esteemed guests: Drs . (LCP neural implants), (PEDOT electrode coatings), (parylene neural implants), and (PDMS neural implants). Tune in as they explore the fascinating world of soft implantable electrodes and brain-nervous system interfaces. Top 3 Takeaways: “In the next five or 10 years, I anticipate that advancements in human neural implants will resemble those we've observed previously. I don't foresee any radical changes in materials or physical attributes. The neurosurgeons I collaborate with prefer implants that aren't excessively flexible or thin to avoid tearing during surgery.” “The first time we delivered an implant to a clinician, these devices were carefully handled by my students. No one dared touch them; they were like sacred objects entrusted to the grad students. When the surgeons got hold of them, they were shocked – bending them in ways we never imagined. Handling these inconsistencies is a crucial aspect to consider, bridging the gap between expectation and reality.” "Everything new is something old that is well forgotten" 3:15 Do all of you want to introduce yourselves? 10:30 What’s a good way for trainees to stay on top of everything there is to learn? 13:45 What is the ideal neural implant and what is the 5-10 year plan for developing these? 20:00 Each of you has a different favorite material for neural implants, do you want to talk about that? 29:45 What motivates you in this field? 35:30 How do you take clinical translation into account in your research? 40:15 What challenges or embarrassing moments have you had in your career? ***Audience Questions*** 43:30 What is your experience and challenges in patenting your electrodes and research? 46:00 What’s the point in doing research if other companies are able to raise significantly more money than we can? 49:00 How do you address the scalability of manufacturing electrodes? 51:15 How groundbreaking do your ideas need to be to be successful? 54:30 How do you deal with paper submission processes that have gone badly? 58:00 How do you deal with a double blind review? 59:00 What’s the most difficult aspect of supervising graduate students? 1:02:00 When can we expect neural implants that interface with all of the neurons in our brain? 1:06:15 How do you deal with materials that aren’t certified for clinical translation? 1:07:45 If you had a magic wand / unlimited funding, what would you do? /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/30614483

Carles Garcia-Vitoria: Pioneering Pain Relief with Intrathecal Spinal Cord Stimulation with Spinally 04/02/2024

Carles Garcia-Vitoria: Pioneering Pain Relief with Intrathecal Spinal Cord Stimulation with Spinally In today's episode, we're joined by , a seasoned pain physician with a unique approach to his work. With extensive experience in regional anesthesia and pain management, Carles shares insights gained from his years of practical experience as he pursues his PhD in Spain. Top 3 Takeaways: "We believe we have the opportunity to target the site of action more effectively. That's why we've founded Spinally, the startup we're currently leading. Our goal is to pioneer intrathecal spinal cord stimulation." "The Dura Mater is highly elastic, closing approximately 80-90% within the first 30 seconds after trauma. Additionally, with improved intrathecal access and emission capabilities, we can utilize thinner implants—reducing implant thickness from 1.3 to 0.5 millimeters. This minimizes trauma to the meningeal sac even further." "We can leverage new fabrication capabilities to minimize implants and achieve highly effective pain relief. Our models, along with others, indicate that we can stimulate deeper layers of the spinal cord with intrathecal electrode positioning, enhancing our ability to listen to deeper neuronal tracts. This advancement is poised to make significant waves in the pain management field within a year." 0:45 Can you introduce yourself better than I just did? 1:15 What advantages of neurotechnology do you see in the pain market? 3:15 What does the pain treatment process using neuromodulation look like? 6:45 How is closed loop stimulation changing your work? 8:30 You’re involved in a startup to better listen to the spinal cord, can you talk about that? 11:30 Why hasn’t this been done before? 14:00 Where in the startup process are you? 15:30 Where are you getting the leads from? 16:30 You guys are raising money, can you talk about that? 18:30 Crowdfunding for medical devices is new, have you seen these before? 21:00 Is there anything that we didn’t cover that you wanted to mention? /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/30590998

Steve Goetz: Revolutionizing Mental Health Treatment as CTO of Motif Neurotech 11/21/2023

Steve Goetz: Revolutionizing Mental Health Treatment as CTO of Motif Neurotech is now the Chief Technology Officer at which is developing a minimally invasive neural implant for the treatment of depression and mental health issues. Steve was at Medtronic for 26 years before moving over to the startup landscape. Top 3 Takeaways: "Starting a big program that you don't know how to finish is a very expensive endeavor, and so you want to really shake out all the science risk, all the technology risk, be pretty sure you can execute a thing before you turn on that big engine because it's expensive once you go" "We know stimulation of the dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex is very efficacious in treatment-resistant depression. Our question is, can we develop a cranial stimulator that can do that in the comfort of a patient's home on demand and with a dosing profile that is matched to that patient's acuity and severity that both treats depression and at some point in the future turns into a maintenance therapy that prevents relapse altogether. And what that looks like to us is a pea-sized stimulator that fits in a minimally invasive burr hole that sits on top of the dura, so not brain penetrating, that delivers this therapy powered externally from a wearable, like a hat or a headband." "For deep brain stimulation, there's a subspecialty of neurosurgery called functional stereotactic neurosurgery with on the order of hundreds of surgeons in the US. There are more that have the specialization to make a burr hole. You go from a few 100 to several 1000 people in the US who can do a burr hole. Over 200,000 burr holes are made in a given year in the US" 1:00 Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did? 3:00 What was that smaller group within Medtronic? 8:30 What does the organizational structure look like at a place like Medtronic? 11:30 What do those teams look like? 16:00 Is each team working on a project? 18:15 18:45 What is Motif all about? 24:15 What is the success rate of TMS and what do you hope to achieve? 25:15 This isn't brain surgery but it is close to it, what's involved in this? 29:15 Could this surgery be done by a lower-skilled person than a neurosurgeon? 31:00 How does insurance reimbursement look like for Motif? 36:15 Why is this technology possible now? 41:30 Your technology seems bikini-ready 42:45 What is the progress of your company? 45:00 What's the small company vs large company life like? 47:30 How long do big decisions take in a big company? 48:45 How is the pace in a small vs small company? 51:00 What is the perfect recipe for working in a meaningful company vs learning in another company? 53:45 Anything else you wanted to mention? /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/28714618

Eric Glowacki on cutting edge neural implant fabrication 10/16/2023

Eric Glowacki on cutting edge neural implant fabrication is a research group leader at the Central European Institute of Technology () located in Brno, Czech Republic. There he studies neural implant fabrication and materials specializing in silicon, parylene, and polyimide devices. He has also started to designs and fabricate devices on a contract basis for other research groups and companies. And, his institute is the one that has been recently sponsoring the podcast! This podcast is sponsored by CEITEC Nano, check out their Neurotech Device Manufacturing Capabilities Top 3 Takeaways: "You can just buy stuff on the internet very simple red LED arrays. So you don't have to bother with aiming because you just put this this light source roughly over the area of interest and, and you can hit the target without having to try very hard." "Most of the time we're pretty fast. If someone sends us a design we can print photo masks in a day or two. That's the slowest step." "And it turns out that the beat frequency can actually stimulate neurons. So you can use these high frequency carrier waves to get in. And then use this constructive interference to actually stimulate to stimulate excitable tissue." 1:15 "Mr. Sponsor, do you want to, do you want to talk about you yourself? What your institute does?" 3:00 "Photovoltaic, transcutaneous neurostimulation. What are the details of that? " 5:15 "How does this compare to other wireless ultrasonics, magnetics, anything else?" 8:15 "What kind of light density would you need?" 9:15 What was your career arc? 12:00 Do you want to talk about Polyimide, Paryle and these other materials? 16:15 17:00 "Talk about your services a little bit" 19:15 What does the contracting process look like if someone wants you to make them devices? 21:45 "Can you talk about the price differences?" 23:30 "Have you thought about opening it up to neurotech companies?" 25:30 Do you want to talk about your success despite you having moved around to many institutes? 28:00 "What do you see as the future of neurotech?" 32:15 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/28323782

Gene Fridman on his freeform stimulator allowing for more neural stimulation possibilities 10/09/2023

Gene Fridman on his freeform stimulator allowing for more neural stimulation possibilities is an Associate Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery and also has appointments with the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research is in the areas of bioinstrumentation and neural engineering. In this episode we talk about his freeform nerual stimulator which allows for DC and any other waveforms without any electrolytic effects on the electrodes. This opens up many possibilities for neural stimulation. We also talk about his startup Aidar which is like a 'tricorder' all-in-one medical diagnostic tool. This podcast is sponsored by CEITEC Nano, check out their Neurotech Device Manufacturing Capabilities Top 3 Takeaways: "The reason why they have to use pulses at the metal electrodes is that if you deliver electrical current for too long to a metal electrode that is implanted in the body, what you're going to get is you're going to get electrochemistry, the first thing that will happen is you're going to start forming bubbles because you're going to split water. It's electrolysis. So you clearly don't want to do that in the body. They have to use pulses charge balanced by phasic pulses otherwise, you're going to have these electrons jump across and cause chemical reactions" "By introducing hyperpolarizing current to the peripheral nerve what we're seeing is it's affecting the small caliber neurons much more so, which carry pain much more so than the larger neurons that carry other information. And so we're able to block pain at the peripheral nerve. We didn't know about this. It was a surprise to us." 0:45 "Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did?" 3:00 Do you want to talk about your device able to talk to both ions and electrons in neurotech? 7:00 Was a DC bridge rectifier the inspiration for this? 9:15 What is possible with these new waveforms? 15:15 "How big is it? And why does it need to be that size?" 21:45 22:15 Do you want to talk about your startup company, ? 24:30 Are you doing any nerve stuff with the 'tricorder?' 26:30 How are you able to manage the time with the startup? 27:45 How did you get the project's initial data? /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/28259468

Kurt Haggestrom on Synchron's Stentrode and Synch Switch 10/02/2023

Kurt Haggestrom on Synchron's Stentrode and Synch Switch comes on to talk about the latest new from , which has developed the Stentrode as well as the new Synchron Switch. Kurt talks about his new role as Chief Commercial Officer and where the company is heading. ***This podcast is sponsored by CEITEC Nano, check out their Neurotech Device Manufacturing Capabilities *** Top three takeaways: 1. "The beauty of this approach is that the blood vessels are an amazing place. To be able to put implants and we've, we're leveraging really decades of science and medical devices in say, the coronary space and the heart space. We know that these types of materials heal very well within the vasculature. It's a very novel approach and really scalable because there's a lot of physicians that can do this type of procedure." 2. "Syncron is developing we're calling it the Synch Switch. So it is an endovascular brain-computer interface system. This system will allow patients who are suffering from paralysis to connect into the digital world, whether it's banking, communication by using a smartphone or computer. 3. "A key part of, I think these types of novel technologies is to think about "how do people afford this when it does get to market?" And with the patients that we're focused on today, many of them use Medicare to be able to afford these technologies. It's critical that we think about our partnership and in working with CMOs to make reimbursement possible for these type of technologies. [1:15] "Do you want to give a refresher on what Synchron does?" [3:00] "What are some exciting news that comes out of Synchron?" [4:15] "So what is Chief Commercialization Officer and why is it necessary, especially for a company like Syncron which isn't commercial yet?" [5:45] ad sponsorship [6:15] "What's your story arc?" [8:30] How are you navigating reimbursement? [9:30] What is your timeline for commercialization? [10:45] "What are some security protocols, that you're putting into place?" [12:30] "What are some of your biggest challenges nowadays?" [16:15] How many patients were in your study? [16:30] How large is the target market? [18:15] Does this have other application potentials outside of locked in patients? [19:15] "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/28174868

Pawel Soluch on launching the Medtech Coaching program with me 06/13/2023

Mounya Elhilali on her auditory processing selectivity research 05/29/2023

Suraj Mudichintala on investing in bioelectronic medicine companies with Action Potential Venture 03/27/2023

Suraj Mudichintala on investing in bioelectronic medicine companies with Action Potential Venture Suraj Mudichintala is a Senior Associate at Action Potential Capital which is GSK's bioelectronic medicine venture fund. Top 3 Takeaways: "Our fund is different in that we invest actually directly off of GSK's balance sheet. So we're what's called an evergreen fund where we don't actually have a fund size" "The way that I think about it is that a VC is really paid to allocate capital but really is really paid to think. You really have to think about what is the next space or the next technology that could disrupt a space? And because of that, it's a much you often have to take a much more longitudinal view. And it takes a lot of patience and tracking a space oftentimes for years" "When you reach out to a VC having a pitch, first of all, sending a non-confidential pitch deck is mandatory, I think. And that deck is essentially where we're making the first decision as to whether or not to do a call with you" 0:45 Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did? 1:15 "Do you wanna talk about Action Potential, what it is, who it was formed by, and the investment thesis?" 2:30 Do you want to talk about the expansion of the AP investment thesis? 4:30 What does traditional Venture Capital look like and how is it different in that you are funded by GSK? 6:15 What do the positions within a VC firm look like? 7:45 How has it been for you going from Analyst to Associate? 8:45 What does your due diligence look like? 11:45 "A lot of VCs have a target size range, be it seed or angel or, maybe larger institutional stuff. But it sounds like you guys don't really have that?" 12:45 "How did you get into this space?" 14:45 "So how does consulting compare to the VC life?" 18:45 "What would you suggest is the best way to get your attention?" 24:00 What are some tips and tricks to reaching out to you? 27:00 What was the worst pitch deck you ever saw? 28:30 " Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/26234421

Balint Varkuti on turning neuromodulation technologies into Brain-Computer-Interfaces using software by CereGate 03/20/2023

Balint Varkuti on turning neuromodulation technologies into Brain-Computer-Interfaces using software by CereGate Balint Varkuti is the CEO of CereGate which unlocks new capabilities for existing neuromodulation technologies using software. Top 3 Takeaways: "the brain is naturally wired for pattern perception for learning, and that's really what we do. We send signals that the brain very quickly can pick up." "You do not need to exclusively be focused mentally, consciously on interpreting these signals. Rather it becomes second nature. Our favourite analogy is saying it is like braille for the brain." "With hardware, you sometimes have simply the disadvantage that you are married to the time point when you started. So if you started a long time ago, you started with that technology and you have a whole regulatory documentation that's building on that. So fundamentally pivoting in hardware down the road almost becomes impossible." 0:45 Do you want to introduce yourself? 3:00 What is special about the software that hasn't already been done? 11:30 The brain is plastic and the software is changing so how does it work with these two systems fighting? 13:30 How can this approach be used to treat Parkinson symptoms such as Freezing of Gait ?" 14:15 Can you read braille? 15:30 "How fast does a patient learn to use this?" 19:00 " How can a company work with you?" 21:15 You guys have been in stealth mode for 4 years, why did it take 4 years and do you have any success stories so far? 23:45 "Do you wanna talk about the regulatory pathway and how it was how to do a software versus a hardware solution?" 27:00 How did your background in behavioral sciences shape your outlook to the company? 30:15 You didn't mention coding in your background, can you talk about starting a software company without much coding experience? 31:30 You have 25 people involved in the company but doesn't seem that you have raised much money, why such a big team? 35:15 "What does the next four years look like? What's on your horizon?" 37:00 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/26234064

Kevin Tracey returns to the podcast to give an update about his work at the Feinstein Institutes, the field of bioelectronic medicine and exciting vagus nerve clinical trials underway 03/13/2023

Kevin Tracey returns to the podcast to give an update about his work at the Feinstein Institutes, the field of bioelectronic medicine and exciting vagus nerve clinical trials underway returns to the podcast to give an update about his work at the and the work at . Top 3 Takeaways: "Two years we discovered that a drug called Famotidine, which is sold as a generic drug Pepcid AC is actually a pharmacological or a drug-based vagus nerve stimulator. And we proved first in mice that famotidine placed directly in very small amounts placed directly in the brains of mice activates the vagus nerve. And this in turn turned off cytokine storm, which of course is a big problem in Covid 19" "A company that I've co-founded, Setpoint Medical, is currently deep into clinical trials in the United States called ResetRA, which is on clinical trials.gov or on the SetPoint website for rheumatoid arthritis patients. And that trial is enrolling many patients up to, I think 250 patients will be studied according to the websites and we're hoping that goes very well. And we're hoping, I'm hoping that leads to FDA approval for vagus nerve stimulation in the US in the coming days or coming in the coming months" "I think we're very close now to vagus nerve stimulation becoming a reality for millions of patients. And I, I hope, and I see a time when patients have the. Of choosing vagus nerve stimulation as a simple, safe therapy instead of dangerous, expensive drugs with black box warnings that are minimally effective." 0;30 "Do you wanna introduce yourself and talk about some of your work, especially as neuromodulation pertains to the immune system?" 2:45 "So the last time when we talked it was 2020. So pandemic, everything was upside down. But then you were telling me before we started recording that it was also especially busy for you at that time. So what were you up to around then?" 6:00 What were the quantitative takeaways of the Famotidine Covid trials? 8:15 "Why didn't it become standard practice?" 11:00 "You're saying the famotidine has this effect on the vagus nerve. Does this mean we no longer need vagus nerve stimulators? Can we just take Pepcid, AC?" 15:00 Do you want to talk about the Bioelectronic Medicine Summit? 17:30 What were some of the highlights of the Summit? 19:30 "You mentioned some interesting results. Is that something you can share now or is that something that we should be on the lookout for?" 21:30 "You were also featured recently in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, what was that like and what were the articles about?" 23:15 "So what's exciting you now for 2023 and what's on the horizon for you for the next few years?" 27:15 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/26114430

Israel Gasperin on measuring cannabis effects quanitatively with EEG with Zentrela 03/06/2023

Colin Kealey on the non-pharmaceutical adolescent ADHD treatment with NeuroSIgma 02/13/2023

Craig Mermel on working at Google and Apple and now at Precision Neuroscience 12/19/2022

Lothar Krinke on adaptive Deep Brain Stimulation at Newronika 12/10/2022

Lothar Krinke on adaptive Deep Brain Stimulation at Newronika Lothar Krinke is the CEO and Board Member of Newronika which is an adaptive Deep Brain Stimulator company looking to improve patient outcomes in things like Parkinson's and Essential Tremor. ***This podcast is sponsored by Iris Biomedical, check out their Neurotech Startup Services Top 3 Takeaways: "the one thing we do need to address is really the cost. The cost driver of Deep Brain Stimulation isn't the manufacturing of the system. Now, that's not cheap either it's certainly less than $10,000. How expensive is brain surgery, particularly functional brain surgery? How expensive is it to have all the pre-operation preparation? So I think the field needs to think about how we can lower the cost of Deep Brain Stimulation to make it available to not hundreds of thousands of patients, but literally millions of patients." "I don't think AI or even machine learning has been sufficiently applied in our space. People do it and they talk about it, but if you look at other fields, even EEG, use of AI or machine learning are much more penetrated." "In my mind it is almost unconscionable that only 15% of patients that could benefit from Parkinsons, from DBS do. So somehow we need to have a battle cry. We need to have the responsibility to make this therapy available to more people. And the way to do that is less invasive more automation and lower cost" 0:45 Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did? 2:15 "Why is Deep Brain Simulation so exciting for you?" 3:15 "Can explain what Deep Brain Stimulation is and what it's a treatment for?" 5:30 "How did you get into the field?" 6:30 ad sponsorship 7:15 You thought earlier that DBS was too invasive but now changed your mind, why? 8:15 What are the biggest impediments to DBS? 12:15 Why is the Newronika DBS better than the alternatives? 14:30 Why is adaptive DBS better? 16:30 "What are some of the biggest challenges right now at Newronika?" 20:30 You are in Minneapolis, West Virginia, and Milan, how are you able to travel so much? 21:30 "Why aren't you in Gainesville? I was surprised how big the DBS field is here." 22:15 "For people starting out in the field, do you have any advice?" 25:30 " What's a big mistake or wrong direction that you see researchers or people on your field going down?" 27:45 "Could you explain the beta and gamma waves?" 32:45 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/25285710

Damiano G. Barone on being a neurosurgeon and improving patient quality of life through surgery 11/28/2022

Damiano G. Barone on being a neurosurgeon and improving patient quality of life through surgery is a neurosurgery clinical lecturer at the University of Cambridge and fellow at The Walton Centre in Liverpool, UK. He is interested in tackling basic and translational challenges for the development of the next generation of neural bioelectronics. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "My favorite procedure is the procedure that works and you see the patient after that is is a changed patient." "You come out from medical school like age 23 or 24. Then you get to a general medical program which in the United Kingdom lasts 2 years in and then you get to the residency, which is 8 years. And then 10 years after you are age 34 practicing the neurosurgeon. I personally took what is called an 'out of programme for research/. So basically I halted my neurosurgery residency. I stepped out and I stepped in a PhD program while still covering what is called the on-call rota, which is basically doing emergency work in neurosurgery just to keep my clinical skills going." This added a few more years of training to the list. "Quality of life procedures, to be offered to the patients, will have to have a 70 to 80% improvement to justify the risks the patient will have to go through." 0:45 Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did? 2:45 You spent 20 years in training for this, did you know this at the outset? 4:00 "What's it like to get only a few hours of sleep for years?" 5:00 Why did you choose to go the PhD route as well? 7:45 What's it like to be digging around in the body? 9:45 Sponsorship by 10:00 "What's your favorite procedures and what's your least favorite procedures?" 12:15 "What percentage of patients see improvements?" 14:30 "What are some, risks other than it not working, what are maybe some damage or maybe even death is that a possibility?" 16:45 "It's much more dangerous to have, a large device versus a small device. Is that kinda what you've seen?" 18:45 "Have you been involved in electrode design or device design?" 19:45 "What are you working on now?" 25:00 "What are the next steps?" 28:00 "What would you recommend or what kind of advice do you have for people considering this?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/25133520

Jon Sakai on interacting with your target patients and the neural sleeve made by Cionic 11/08/2022

Hannah Claridge on helping small neurotech companies with R&D work at TTP 11/01/2022

Hannah Claridge on helping small neurotech companies with R&D work at TTP is the Head of Neurotechnology at which is a consultancy that helps neurotech companies create the next generation of medical devices. ***This podcast is sponsored by Iris Biomedical, check out their Neurotech Startup Services Top 3 Takeaways: "I think consulting is really fantastic for the variety that it offers you. Not just in terms of seeing problems, but also working with different types of companies, different types of technologies, and having different day-to-day activities as well" "There have been cases where we've worked with very small companies where the company is composed of two or three founders whose sole role is the concept of the idea and the thinking behind what's the business case, and then gathering in the funding and passing that funding through for us to carry out the product development work. Now that's pretty unusual in most cases." "You need to be able to balance the efficacy of treatment with the side effects that are usually created. And if you go too far in one direction or the other, then that treatment stops being helpful. So if you stimulate too strongly, and the effect might be really effective but if the side effects are too strong, then patients aren't going to tolerate that." 0:45 Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did? 1:45 "Let's talk about clinical translation, what does that entail?" 4:45 ad sponsorship 5:45 "What's a typical contract length and what does it look like from beginning to end?" 9:00 "It really sounds like you guys do everything. You could just take an idea and then bring it almost all the way to market" 10:15 "Do you wanna share the neurotech projects you've worked on?" 11:15 "What's a common problem that you see?" 17:15 "How does a company recover, like from having so much help to not having any help? Is that typical too?" 19:45 "What does your day-to-day look like? What are you usually doing?" 22:30 What's a typical pathway into the career of consulting? 25:15 "If you had unlimited funding or if a company had unlimited funding, what would you do?" 28:00 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/24860676

Lindsey Jardine talks all about clinical trials for neurotech 10/24/2022

Dan Brounstein on how closed loop Spinal Cord Stimulation has better efficacy at Saluda 10/17/2022

Dr Angelique Johnson on starting a Medical Device Outsource Manufacturer, MEMStim 10/12/2022

John Seymour on directional depth arrays and the future of neurosurgery 09/26/2022

John Seymour on directional depth arrays and the future of neurosurgery is an in Neurosurgery and at where his lab works on electrophysiology studies, biophysics modeling, and applying machine learning models to decoding of neural activity. A major project in our lab is focused on developing a long-term brain-machine interface for the treatment of aphasia or locked-in syndrome. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "Your job as the engineer is to create a high resolution map of a crowd's vocalization during some live event, the rules are, you only get the place, say 10 or 20 devices throughout the stadium but only on these devices. At some point you realize more and more microphones on these poles are going to generate redundant information and they won't help us in our challenge to map the vocalization of this massive stadium. People have a very good intuition for sounds and we all understand sound is directional. Neural signals act the same way." "A rough rule of thumb is if the substrate diameter is on the order of magnitude of the source size, then there is good directionality in that situation." One day neural devices will be based on the patient's anatomy and will be printed on-demand to match the patient 0:45 "Do you want to introduce yourself better than I just did?" 2:45 "Geographically, how close are Rice and UT health?" 3:15 "You're saying the future of neural implants is additive depth electrodes. What does that mean?" 13:45 Sponsorship by 14:15 "What's the solution, to try to make them directional?" 16:30 "So you basically need your collector to be as small as possible?" 18:30 "So by finding the right size of the electrode and the substrate diameter you're able to have directional electrodes?" 22:45 "What's the advantage of your technology? What does it change?" 28:00 " If you had unlimited funding, what would you be able to do with it?" 33:00 What kind of differences of electrode design would you expect patient to patient? 34:45 "These few years ago, you said you were at Rice before, exclusively, and then now moved to both UT Health and Rice. What's that been like?" 42:00"Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/24425334

Andre Mercanzini on revolutionizing Deep Brain Stimulation using small directional probes by Aleva Neuro 09/19/2022

Andre Mercanzini on revolutionizing Deep Brain Stimulation using small directional probes by Aleva Neuro is the Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer at which has worked in directional Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) device leads for Parkinson's and other diseases. ***This podcast is sponsored by Iris Biomedical, check out their Neurotech Startup Services Top 3 Takeaways: "We realized during that time that the intervention that could benefit the most from the miniaturization technologies was by far and away, deep brain stimulation." "MEMS allowed us to align every single electrode into its position, have it almost prewired and decrease the amount of touch time that an operator would have to spend on the device as they're manufacturing it, which, which gives us a price advantage as well." "My advice to PhD students postdocs, physician inventors, and professors working on neuro technologies is that you have to work on something that will make a major change in patient outcomes. It cannot just be incremental. If it has any signs of only being incremental, it will be very difficult to get funded. It will be very difficult to get your early adopters to sign up and use or test your device. It's always a difficult metric to determine what that means. Is it a 20% improvement in symptoms? Is it a 40% improvement in symptoms? Is it treating a disease that is not treatable today? That is really the major choice you have to make as an entrepreneur in your own technology is whether your work will make a significant change in patient outcomes." 0:30 "Do you want to explain what Aleva does a little bit and a little bit of your background?" 3:30 "What would you say that is a special thing in Lausanne that maybe other places could copy or are not able to copy?" 5:00 "Let's talk about Aleva" 6:45 " ad sponsorship" 7:15 "What's DBS and how did Aleva get started? You were saying this spun out of your PhD work. What did that look like then? And maybe how has it changed now?" 13:15 "Why is having directional leads was such a design problem?" 16:45 "What has the evolution been in the last decade, and then maybe what's future directions?" 20:30 You raised $70 million to get through the regulatory pathway, this seems like alot, couldn't you do it with 5 or 10 million? 23:30 Surgeons often like to stick with what they know, do you know if there would be a demand for what you are making? 25:45 Do you want to talk about wearables and how this fits in with your company? 29:00 "What advice do you have for people who want to follow in your footsteps and want to, create, raise $70 million and do you have to be in Switzerland to do this?" 31:45 "You've raised a lot of money and so is that good or bad and aren't you worried about being diluted too much?" 34:00 " Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/24355890

Vasiliki Giagka on Neural Interface Packaging and why it's the most important 09/12/2022

Vasiliki Giagka on Neural Interface Packaging and why it's the most important is an and where she conducts research on the design and fabrication of active neural interfaces. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "Water vapor is not dangerous for neural devices, it will not cause your metals to corrode, as long as it remains in the form of vapor. The moment it condenses into liquid water and you have ions in there, is when corrosion can start, and that is the beginning of the end" Conformal polymer coatings have been implanted in bodies for decades but we lack means to prove upfront the amount of time a certain coated device would last in the body "Our aim is not to create startup ourselves, but it is really to help this ecosystem by supporting companies working on this" 0:30 "How do you work in Berlin and the Hague in the Netherlands at the same time? 2:30 "Why especially neural device packaging?" 5:15 "What's the size of your guys' device or packing?" 7:15 "Do you want to, do you wanna describe the neural implant network mesh a little bit more and how does it work and why is it necessary?" 9:15 Sponsorship by 9:45 "So let's talk about maybe conformal coatings. What is it, how does it work? Why is it necessary?" 19:00 "So what are some rough numbers, is one method better than the other, and then how many years of simulated life can one survive versus the other?" 21:45 "So how do we test it? How do we do the accelerated testing to be able to simulate a human lifespan?" 25:00 "So now you also work on the wireless power delivery, wireless transmission. How is this, how does this work? Why is this important?" 31:00 "Neurons fire with electrical signals and you're using ultrasound. So how does that work? Why is it able to work?" 32:00 "How does the power usage compare with electrical or ultrasound cuffs?" 33:30 "Let's talk about your graphene work." 37:30 "These three areas that you're working on, these all seem like very good candidates for, a spinoff company or some kind of, patents. Have you thought about this?" 42:00 "If you had unlimited funding, what would you do?" 43:45 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/24205692

Jacob George on implantable and wearable neurotech research at the University of Utah 09/05/2022

Jacob George on implantable and wearable neurotech research at the University of Utah is an assistant professor at the University of Utah where his seeks to augment biological neural networks with artificial neural networks and bionic devices to treat neurological disorders and to further our understanding of neural processing. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "I'm 28 years old. So very young still getting stuff set up and really kickstarting it. The average age that NIH states for someone to get an R01 is somewhere around 47 years old and they really wanna change that. They wanna get people into science earlier. And so that's the mechanism that I went through and so very fortunate to have that funding to kick start stuff." "The idea is, you had a stroke, you wake up in a hospital, you get the fitted with this bionic arm that helps you move immediately. So it's like nothing happened. And as you're doing these things in your real world life, all of a sudden. You don't need the exoskeleton anymore because your hand's back to use because you have rehabilitated yourself." "A one-off grant is great, that's luck, if you get one thing that's luck, but repeatedly, being successful in funding starts to show a pattern of success that is more and more unlikely that it was just luck." 0:45 "Do you want to introduce yourself?" 2:30 "You're also a pretty new professor. How old are you also?" 4:30 "How did you get into this field?" 6:15 Sponsorship by 7:00 "Do you want to go in a little bit more in-depth about the different aspects of your research and maybe we could start with the Luke arm." 13:45 "So what does the training look like for the patients?" 17:00 "That calibration sounds tedious. How long is it?" 19:45"Is glial scarring also a problem in the peripheral nervous system or is it worse, better? How does it compare to the central nervous system?" 21:00 "Do you wanna talk a little bit about exoskeletons?" 25:45 "Which one do you love more, invasive or noninvasive?" 30:30 "What's especially motivating you to deal with this specific patient population?" 33:00 "Do you have any tips for people who might want to fall in your footsteps of being a young professor?" 36:45 "How similar is your training between, what you're doing at the PhD, working at the bench versus, being a professor and, needing to find those dollar bills?" 39:45 What specific exercises would you recommend for finding funding? 44:45 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/24204969

Ana Maria Porras on inclusive science communication in different languages 08/29/2022

Giacomo Valle on working with patients, animals, and computational models for neurotech 08/15/2022

Giacomo Valle on working with patients, animals, and computational models for neurotech is a post-doc researcher at ETH Zurich working in the to find tools for neurologically disabled amputees and diabetic persons. They look at how to decode from devices and what that would look like for the development of new devices. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "We're working on the sensory feedback restoration in people where there is a sensory loss due to neuropathy. The limbs are there there is sensory loss due to the degeneration and neuropathic degeneration. And then with electrical simulation is possible to provide sensation back," The secret to having an H-index of 17 as a Post-Doc is to have a passion for what you do an to work long hours with great people Simulations can take a long time to set up and one bad variable can mess up a week's worth of work but gives you flexibility to work anywhere; Animal work means you can't take vacations but you can do more experiments; Patient work is rewarding because you develop bonds with them but sometimes are limited by experiments 0:45 "Do you want to introduce yourself?" 3:30 "How does your work work?" 6:15 "What kind of devices do you use and what kind of bandwidth is involved?" 9:00 Sponsorship by 9:30 "You do seem to have a lot about computation and modeling. What role does this play in your research?" 13:00 "How good are the simulation predictions?" 19:30 "5 or 10 years down the line, what would your research lead to?" 22:45 "You have an H index of 17, which is crazy for a post-doc. What's your secret?" 25:45 "You've worked with patients, computational work, and animal work. You have these three perspectives of research, which is the easiest, which is the hardest, what are the advantages and disadvantages of all of those?" 30:30 "What do you think will be some future breakthroughs in this work and what does the future look like?" 33:15 "How much longer before you get implanted?" 34:45 "If you had unlimited funding, what would you spend it on?" 37:30 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/23930070

Jotthe Kannappan on being a Venture Capitalist for minimally invasive medical technologies 08/08/2022

Jotthe Kannappan on being a Venture Capitalist for minimally invasive medical technologies is an associate at which is all about converging robotic systems, digital tools, and clinical needs in search of new ways to understand, diagnose, treat and manage disease. ***This podcast is sponsored by Iris Biomedical, check out their Neurotech Startup Services Top 3 Takeaways: "It's not about rejection. It's about enabling the best possible fit between an entrepreneur and an investor who is able to who's able to really do what the company needs for them" "The typical things that stand out are really well clearly articulated message again about an unmet medical needs is something that comes across really strongly in a first interaction with a VC" "It's a common pitfall to be a technology that's searching for a need as opposed to a need-driven technology." 1:00 "Do you want to talk about the thesis of Intuitive Ventures?" 2:30 "How long has Intuitive Surgical, the parents company been around? And do you want to talk about some of your investments so far?" 4:15 "What's your guys' thoughts on neurotechnology and brain-computer interfaces? What's attractive about neuro technology or maybe not attractive?" 6:00 "When a company might want to come to you and is looking for funding, what what are you looking for?" 8:45 ad sponsorship 9:30 "It sounds like the companies you invest in are a little bit further stage, or do you invest in early stage as well?" 10:15 "What's exciting for you guys at the moment?" 12:30 What percentage of people do you reject? 15:15 "What other tips or tricks are there to and you get your attention and maybe get a successful interaction out of it?" 17:15 "What are some of your biggest challenges?" 18:45 "If you had unlimited funding, what would you do with it?" 23:15 How do world political issues like the Covid pandemic and Ukraine-Russia war affect the investment landscape? 26:15 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/23929974

Benjamin Stecher on being a Parkinson's patient advocate 08/01/2022

Benjamin Stecher on being a Parkinson's patient advocate runs a blog called the where he talks about his battle with Parkinson's disease. He has been implanted with a Deep Brain Stimulator an is also on the patient advisory board of Rune Labs where he gives them a perspective from the patient's point of view. ***This podcast is sponsored by Ripple Neuro, check out their Neuroscience Research Tools Top 3 Takeaways: "It got to the point where the Livadopa medication on-off fluctuations were so impairing to my daily life that I had maybe like an hour where I felt normal per day" "But to compare it to the medication now, it's night and day. It brought my baseline to the point where I felt more or less normal. Now I'm still not completely normal, things need to be optimized, but it's night and day compared to what it was before. It's very easy now for me to have these moments where I even forget that I have this disease at all " "There's nothing in my brain that anybody can point to and say, okay, this is what Parkinson's disease is. I don't believe that Parkinson's Disease exists" 1:00 Do you want to talk about your background? 2:45 "You were pretty young when you were diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. Do you want to talk about that?" 3:30 "What was the timeline of the disease?" 6:15 "You decided to crack your skull open and then put something in there. What was that kind of decision like? And then what were the results of that as well?" 7:30 Sponsorship by 7:45 "What's it been like and maybe how does it compare to the medication and was the results immediate?" 9:15 "You have an adaptive DBS implanted. Do you want to explain what this is?" 14:15 "Let's talk about your blog Tomorrow Edition" 15:30 "Let's talk about your work at Rune labs" 17:30 "Let's talk about your book to Brain Fables" 23:00 "If you had a magic wand, what would you be doing and what kind of improvements would you want to do?" 27:15 "Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you wanted to mention?" [email protected] /episode/index/show/neuralimplant/id/23929536

Neural Implant podcast - the people behind Brain-Machine Interface revolutions

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