Challenges in the Design of Large-Scale, High-Density, Wireless Stimulation and Recording Interface Po-Min Wang, Stanislav Culaclii, Kyung Jin Seo, Yushan Wang, Hui Fang, Yi-Kai Lo, and Wentai Liu 1 Introduction Neural stimulation and recording have been widely applied to fundamental research to better understand the nervous systems as well as to the clinical therapy of a variety of diseases. Well-known examples include monitoring and manipulating neural activities in the brain to map the brain function [1–3], spinal cord implant to restore the motor function after spinal cord injury [4–6], gastrointestinal (GI) implant to monitor and treat GI motility disorders [7–9], and retinal prostheses to regain eyesight in the blind [10–12]. These applications require continuous techno- logical advancement in designs of stimulation and recording electronics, electrodes, and the interconnections between the electronics and the electrodes. Despite technological advances to date, there are still challenges to overcome in applications requiring large-scale, high-density, wireless stimulation and recording. Concretely, the study of the brain function through monitoring and manipulating neural activities in freely moving and behaving subjects requires decoding the com- plex brain dynamics by mapping brain activity with both large-scale and high spa- tial resolution. This decoding demands a large-scale, high-density electrode array with small electrode size, which imposes significant challenges in electrode array fabrication as well as its interconnect with electronics. In addition, the capability to record high channel number implies the need for wireless electronics with high P.-M. Wang · S. Culaclii · Y. Wang · W. Liu (*) Department of Bioengineering, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA e-mail:
[email protected] K.