Development of Three Dimensional Roll-up Polymer-Si Structure for Nerve Ablation Catheter

Renal denervation procedure had been emerging as a potential treatment for resistant hypertension condition. It is a minimally invasive procedure where radiofrequency (RF) energy is supplied to ablate and deactivate the renal artery nerve. The deactivation of the renal nerve helps to reduce and control the patient’s blood pressure level. In order to achieve multiple ablation sites per ablation cycle, multiple discrete RF electrodes and temperature sensors components are required for integration with ablation catheter. This is a tedious and time consuming process. To address this issue, this paper proposed a three dimensional roll-up polymer-silicon structure with an overall thickness of 110um for easy of assembly. This roll-up structure with a ‘belt’ slot feature will be used for assembling of MEMS based sensor chip into a single component. Bench-top mechanical testing to simulate the activation and de-activation of the catheter had been performed. The roll-up structure was able to achieve a smooth activation of 5° to 62° with a maximum length of 8mm (diameter) for 10 repeated cycles.