Team members: Manuel Monge, Mayank Raj and Meisam Honarvar-Nazari
Retinal degenerative diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa (RP) and age-related macular degeneration (AMD) are leading causes of blindness, affecting millions worldwide. They damage the photoreceptors, which convert light into electrical signals, but leave the rest of retinal cells functional. The aim of retinal prostheses is to restore vision in these patients by bypassing the damaged photoreceptors and directly stimulating the remaining healthy neurons.
The prosthesis consists of an external system and an implant. The external system captures and processes the visual information that is wirelessly transmitted to the implant through inductively coupled coils. In the same way, power is transmitted via another set of coils. The implant integrates the receiver coils, the IC and the electrode array, which is connected to the retina. The IC receives data and power, and generates biphasic current patterns to stimulate bipolar and ganglion retinal cells. To restore functional visual perception, hundreds of stimulation channels are needed. This requires the use of small electrodes, which increases the impedance of the electrode-tissue interface (>10kOhm).Previous designs used high voltage technologies to support the high output voltage compliance at the expense of area and power consumption. Our approach uses highly-scaled technologies to reduce area and the power consumption, and proposes effective techniques to overcome the limitations of the technology for this application.
In order to restore functional visual perception, hundreds of stimulation channels are needed. This requires the use of small electrodes (≈100μm diameter) which increase the impedance of the electrode-retina interface (>10kOhm). Initial designs targeted current levels up to 1mA to ensure stimulation of retinal cells. For such designs, an output compliance of more than 10V was required and high voltage technologies were used at the expense of area and power consumption. Human clinical trials have recently shown that implanted electrodes present a stimulus threshold as low as 20μA. Thus, our approach uses highly scaled technologies to reduce area and power, and to support hundreds of channels for fully intraocular implants.
A fully intraocular high-density self-calibrating epiretinal prosthesis in 65nm CMOS has been developed. It provides charge-balanced stimulation with highly flexible waveforms. It features dual-band telemetry for power and data, on-chip rectifier and clock recovery, a digital calibration technique to match biphasic stimulation currents, and 512 independent channels capable of arbitrary waveform generation.
This project is a collaborative effort with the support of NSF and USC’s BMES-ERC (Biomimetic Microelectronic Systems – Engineering Research Center).
- Caltech EAS News: Intraocular Implant Research Wins at Broadcom Foundation Competition
M. Monge, A. Emami, “Design Considerations for High-Density Fully Intraocular Epiretinal Prostheses,”(Invited) IEEE Biomedical Circuits and Systems Conference (BIOCAS), 2014[ PDF ]
M. Monge, M. Raj, M. Honorvar-Nazari, H.C. Chang, Y. Zhao, J. Weiland, M. Humayun, Y.C. Tai, A. Emami, “A Fully Intraocular High-Density Self-Calibrating Epiretinal Prosthesis,”(Invited) IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Circuits and Systems, vol.7, no.6, pp.747-760, Dec. 2013[ PDF ]
Y. Liu, J. Park, YC tai, R. Lang, A. Emami-Neyestanak, S. Pellegrino and M. Humayun, “Parylene Origami Structure for Intraocular Implantation“, IEEE Transducers Conference, 2013[ PDF ]
M. Monge, M. Raj, M. Honorvar-Nazari, H.C. Chang, Y. Zhao, J. Weiland, M. Humayun, Y.C. Tai, A. Emami-Neyestanak, “A Fully Intraocular 0.0169mm2/pixel 512-Channel Self-Calibrating Epiretinal Prosthesis in 65nm CMOS“, IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), Feb. 2013[ PDF ]
J. Chang, Y. Liu, D. Kang, M. Monge, Y. Zhao, C.C. Yu, A. Emami-Neyestanak, J. Weiland, M. Humayun, Y.C. Tai, “Packaging Study for a 512-Channel Intraocular Epiretinal Implant“, IEEE International Conference on Micro Electro Mechanical Systems(MEMS), Jan. 2013[ PDF ]