Micro-Fabrication of Components for a High-Density Sub-Retinal Visual Prosthesis

Photovoltaic Retinal Prosthesis with High Pixel Density

Retinal degenerative diseases lead to blindness due to loss of the "image capturing" photoreceptors, while neurons in the "image processing" inner retinal layers are relatively well preserved. Electronic retinal prostheses seek to restore sight by electrically stimulating surviving neurons. Most implants are powered through inductive coils, requiring complex surgical methods to implant the coil...

High-Fidelity Reproduction of Spatiotemporal Visual Signals for Retinal Prosthesis

Natural vision relies on spatiotemporal patterns of electrical activity in the retina. We investigated the feasibility of veridically reproducing such patterns with epiretinal prostheses. Multielectrode recordings and visual and electrical stimulation were performed on populations of identified ganglion cells in isolated peripheral primate retina. Electrical stimulation patterns were designed t...

Use of Composite Layers in Fabrication of Micro Electrode Arrays for Retinal Prosthesis

Photovoltaic retinal prosthesis: implant fabrication and performance.

The objective of this work is to develop and test a photovoltaic retinal prosthesis for restoring sight to patients blinded by degenerative retinal diseases. A silicon photodiode array for subretinal stimulation has been fabricated by a silicon-integrated-circuit/MEMS process. Each pixel in the two-dimensional array contains three series-connected photodiodes, which photovoltaically convert pul...

Encapsulation of Electronic Components for a Retinal Prosthesis

Long-term success of an implantable retinal prosthesis depends on the ability to hermetically seal sensitive electronics from a saline environment with an encapsulant material. Furthermore, the retinal implant project's proposed laser-driven prosthesis requires that the encapsulation material be transparent. The device itself has two components that must protrude out of the encapsulation materi...