New flexible electronics can better chart the heart's electrical activity.
By Duncan Graham-Row March 29, 2010 |
"A new flexible and biocompatible electronic device can produce a more detailed picture of the electrical activity of a beating heart. This high-resolution electrical map could help improve the diagnosis and treatment of heart abnormalities by pinpointing areas of damage or misfiring circuitry.
...The flexible device can be used to attach multiple sensors to the wall of a beating heart, measuring electrical activity at multiple sites despite the heart's movement. The electronics needed to record this activity are also built into the device, meaning more data can be collected. The new device is 25 microns thick and covers 1.5 square centimeters. It contains over 2,000 transistors sealed within a flexible coating and is covered with 288 sensor electrodes. So far the device has been tested successfully in pigs."
Beat box: This implantable medical device bends and twists, thanks to transistors made of ultrathin ribbons of silicon. The electrode array shown here has 288 electrodes that can maintain contact with a heart even as it beats.
Credit: Science/AAAS
http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/24889/?a=f
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