Documents / Report
This Defense Intelligence Agency reference document, dated 31 March 2010 (DIA-08-1003-020), was one of a series of advanced technology reports produced in FY 2009 under the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications (AAWSA) program. It surveys biosensors and BioMEMS, covering brain-implanted neuroelectrodes, drug-delivery pumps, implantable glucose sensors, brain-machine interfaces, retinal prostheses, microfluidic lab chips, NASA cell culture systems, and microcantilever sensors. It concludes that the field is expanding rapidly toward nanomechanical systems.
UNCLASSIFIED/ ,'Pelt 9PPH!ltlrt 1!181!! &HLY thermoelectric sensors have improved reproducibility of the sensors, but there has only been limited success in applications of implantation into the body. Neuroengineering by BioMEMS BioMEMS types of devices, as we understand them today, were used first in neuroscience. There has been a long history of the study of the electrical nature of body tissue dating back to the days of Galvani and Volta. Frog nerves were found to be electrically stimulatable and the first recordings of bioelectrical events were accomplished very early with the invention of the string galvanometer. More recently, pointed wires inserted into muscle, nerve and brain have given way to MEMS electrode systems that are made on silicon supporting substrates and the processes of photolithography used to define electrical current pathways. Figure 17 shows a modern electrode system for detecting and recording electrical signals from living things. Each of the square regions is an exposed film of platinum while the thinner conductors that contact the pads are insulated by a thin layer of a plastic and conduct the detected electrical signals to a connector system (not shown). Figure 17. A MEMS Biopotential Electrode System. It is approximately 100 microns in width. Each square pad is an electrically sensitive region. (Wikiped1a) BIOELECTRIC EVENTS The living processes of biology can in some ways be likened to that of a battery. The metabolism of life produces the charging of the battery while it discharges through a myriad of bioelectrical events that produce movement, thought, and cognition. The transfer of electrical charge in the form of ions, mostly sodium, potassium and chloride is initiated by bioelectrically excitable cells of the nerves, muscles, and neurons of the brain. Collectively they constitute the wiring of the body. These ions result from the salts that are part of the composition of living things that have evolved from the sea. The movements of these ions constitutes the flow of an electrical current in tissues and are called bioelectrical currents. These currents give rise to electrical potentials that can be detected from the skin or by biopotential electrodes inserted into organs or muscle. 20 UNCLASSIFIED// I Oit 9PPI@Itllb l!lliEii SUIL¥
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Report, from the dia collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 45 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.