Next Generation Microscale Wireless Implant System for High-Density, Multi-areal, Closed-Loop Brain Computer Interfaces

A major challenge to high-resolution, closed-loop Brain Computer Interfaces (BCIs) is the availability of implantable technologies facilitating vastly parallel, large-scale access to cortical neural data representing complex, naturalistic tasks or sophisticated therapeutic neuromodulation. The current technological bottleneck is scalability of systems employing intra or epicortical electrode arrays with hard-wired tethers and bulky implant packaging. We address these challenges by employing an approach relying on spatially-distributed, completely wireless clusters of autonomous microscale neural interfaces, where each microdevice provides a single bidirectional channel (read-out and write-in) of neural access, and occupies a volume <0.01 mm2 inclusive of biocompatible packaging for long-term implantation. Wireless power transfer, high-bandwidth bidirectional telecommunications and adaptive networking across multi-areal clusters are managed by a wearable external module to produce an implantable device system with anatomic flexibility and scalability, forming a “cortical internet”.