Doctor Henry Greely is a professor of law at Stanford University . His primary focus surrounds discussing the ethics of biological innovation and their implications to society. He is the president and founder of the International Neuroethics Society . In this episode, he delves into the complications associated with developing ethics in the similarly developing fields of biotechnology. Top Three Takeaways: There are gaps in the ethical standards surrounding new biomedical advancements. Researche...
May 27, 2019•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Doctor Takashi Kozai, or Doctor TK Kozai, is currently an assistant professor at the Swanson School of Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh . He currently works in his own laboratory and researches in-vivo calcium brain imaging. He also has a background in research concerning carbon electrode development. He has been offered to work with the Neuralink Team associated with Elon Musk , but turned down the offer to focus on the innovational aspects of neural implant development. Top Three Ta...
Apr 29, 2019•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Doctor Alejandra Gonzalez is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Texas-Dallas that works in the fields of neurotechnology. She currently focuses on how she can develop graphing fibers that have better electrochemical properties for implantable devices. Top Three Takeaways: Her team is creating graphing fibers without good electrochemical properties and good mechanical properties to use as electrical interfaces in peripheral nerves. Conventional electrodes have charge capacities that r...
Apr 22, 2019•5 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ian Baumgart is a Biomedical Engineering Master’s student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison . He currently conducts research in Doctor Kip Ludwig’s Neural Engineering Laboratory . Baumgart’s current project focuses on the Injectrode, which is an injectable pre-polymer that can act as a conductor throughout the body along with nerves. Top Three Takeaways: The Injectrode is basically liquid pre-polymer with conductive particles that are completely injectable. The benefits of this procedure in...
Apr 15, 2019•7 min•Transcript available on Metacast Doctor Cary Kuliasha is a postdoctoral research associate working with Doctor Jack Judy’s research laboratory at the University of Florida . His team focuses on the potential effects the body’s environment could have on biomedical devices over time through accelerated aging. Kuliasha’s work currently focuses on how Anisotropic Conductive Adhesive technology could be applied to bioelectronics since it is currently used in computer technology. Top Three Takeaways: The point of the project is to mi...
Apr 08, 2019•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Andrew Trask is currently a student at Oxford University and Author of Grokking Deep Learning performing his Ph.D. concerning anonymizing data. He discusses the facts concerning deep and machine learning and their possible benefits to society. Trask also discusses privacy securing techniques that would further benefit the field. Finally, Trask discusses his connection with Open Mind, which is a company that uses machine and deep learning to overcome the barriers in adoption. Top Three Takeaways:...
Mar 25, 2019•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast Cory Inman is a postdoctoral fellow at Emory University School of Medicine who studies the effect deep brain stimulation has on the emotional experience of humans. He seeks to treat depression in patients and potentially improve their memories through the effects of deep brain stimulation. In this episode, he explains how his team studies deep brain stimulation and navigates the ethics associated with the rising technology. Top Three Takeaways: The exact areas of brain stimulation determine if t...
Mar 11, 2019•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jim Cavuoto runs Neurotech Reports where he seeks to educate the industry and public concerning neurotechnology and neuroprosthetics. Cavuoto studied at Case Western University as a biomedical engineering student and began writing about neurotechnology as an undergraduate student. His organization serves as an information source for four fields of neurotechnology: neuromodulation, neuroprosthetics, neurosensing, and neurorehabilitation; a yearly growth report and weekly newsletter is provided by...
Mar 04, 2019•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jennifer French of Neurotech Reports received a spinal cord injury in 1998 and became the first woman to receive the Stand and Transfer neural implant system. A silver medalist in sailing at the 2012 Paralympic Games, she sits down to discuss her experiences with her implantable device and how it has affected her life. During this discussion, she mentions her struggles and successes with her device along with her concerns and hopes for the technology. If you like this episode then come to the Bi...
Feb 25, 2019•55 min•Transcript available on Metacast ***Apologies! The wrong episode audio was incorrectly uploaded previously*** Dr. Francisco Delgado , or Frank, has worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University Florida under Dr. Kevin Otto’s laboratory for a little over two years. As he plans to move on and pursue his career with the Food and Drug Administration , he reflects back on what he received as working in the Otto lab. Not only does he offer advice to future postdoctoral researchers, he also points out how they can receive the ...
Feb 18, 2019•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Thomas Hughes, JD works as the senior principal advisor for The Regulatory and Clinical Research Institute based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His organization works to assist medical device companies pass regulatory steps to sell their product and find paths for reimbursements necessary to fund the medical devices. He stresses that one of the most critical steps in developing a device involves focusing on the reimbursement process. Top Three Takeaways: Medical device companies must consider the re...
Feb 11, 2019•21 min•Transcript available on Metacast Doctor Frederic Gilbert works at the University of Tasmania in Australia and studies neuroethics. A major theme is how Deep Brain Stimulation affects personality disorders. In a very limited amount of research, studies have indicated that some patients have experienced strong personality changes inclining them to depression, addiction and sometimes even suicide. Gilbert paints the importance of medical ethics when making medical innovations in order to protect patients. He argues that medical et...
Feb 04, 2019•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast Robert Gaunt is in the field of biomedical engineering from the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation focusing on sensory neuroprosthetics. His research aims to assist patients who suffer from afflictions that range from amputations to bladder control. He recognizes the challenges the development of neuroprosthetics faces and urges that more funding and research be put into solving these dilemmas. Gaunt makes clear the importance of group collaboration in ...
Jan 28, 2019•19 min•Transcript available on Metacast Roberta Goode started Goode Compliance International to assist companies in the industry of biomedical engineering facing the scrutiny of regulations instilled by organizations like the Food and Drug Administration. Goode explains the purpose of her company and the path she took to ensure its success through years of experience and learning. She later began Altrec LLC as a second career to assist clients to break down the complexities associated with starting a company and promoting a service or...
Jan 21, 2019•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast Founded by Martin Bak in 1983, Microprobes for Life Science seeks to provide a unique electrode model that uses Parylene-C as an insulator. This company aims to sell customizable products to neuroscientists studying electrophysiology. All products are handmade, tested for precision and quality, and made by request of the customer. The company has experienced steady growth at 6-8% since its conception and uses its handmade approach as its business model. Top Three Takeaways: Microprobes for Life ...
Jan 14, 2019•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast As the Chief Executive Officer of Nia Therapeutics , Dan Rizzuto and his team are currently developing a neurological implant that increases the memory of patients suffering from Alzheimer’s diseases and traumatic brain injury. By using deep brain stimulation (DBS) to increase high frequency functions and decrease low frequency functions in areas important to memory, such as the frontal lobe, Nia Therapeutics has successfully improved memory capability by 18%. Though this is only the beginning f...
Dec 10, 2018•35 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jack Judy is the director of Nanoscience Institute for Medical and Engineering Technologies at the University of Florida He serves to bridge the divide between engineering, medicine, and the sciences through the work he does with neurotechnologies and neural implants. He has focused on peripheral nerve interfaces and how stimulating these could help amputees in the Wounded Warrior Project. He has worked with DARPA for several years where he has revolutionized biotechnology and biomedicine to con...
Dec 03, 2018•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast This is the first of our Neural Implant roundtable where we talk with former guests Doug Clinton of Loup Ventures , Manfred Franke of Neuronoff , and Avery Bedows who founded the neural implant blog, the Substrate. This podcast focuses on the relationship between the public and the neurotechnology in the modern world. The key questions concerning the podcasts involve what, when, how and why should neurotechnology be discussed in public. ~0min - introductions and explaining their experiences that...
Nov 09, 2018•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast I talked to Christopher Thomas today about his job as a Science Writer at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) . How he went from being a graduate student to working as someone in media for the government. Since this is a new career path on this podcast we talk about the steps to get there and what others can do if they are interested in doing something similar....
Sep 24, 2018•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this second part of the great interview, I was able to have with Jennifer French in her hometown of St. Petersburg Florida, we talked about the futures of many of the Brain Machine Interface technologies. Since she works for a reporting journal on the developments of the field, she knows everything about what is going on and the potentials of each of the technologies. I found this to be one of the most interesting conversations I have had because I also like to learn about the financial side ...
Sep 18, 2018•45 min•Transcript available on Metacast I had the great pleasure to meet with Jennifer French of Neurotech reports in St. Petersburg....Florida!!! In this first part of the episode we talk about her C6-7 spinal chord injury that has left her tetrapalegic for the last 20 years. But just as her accident was epic, so was the rest of her story with not taking no for an answer as being one of the defining themes in her story. Tomorrow we will be publishing the second part of the interview....
Sep 17, 2018•20 min•Transcript available on Metacast I've actually been in contact with Doug Clinton for many months but only now have done an episode. He is a managing partner at Loup Ventures which has recently invested money in companies such as Neurable and former guest Paradromics. In this episode, we talk about why their firm invests in companies which have a longer time horizon like medical device companies rather than software companies like in Silicon Valley. He talks about what he looks for in a company when investing and why their compa...
Sep 10, 2018•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this last episode from my interviews from the 2018 Neural Interfaces Conference in Minneapolis I talk to Dr Jacob Robinson about his idea to image potentially millions of neurons in parallel using a lensless imaging technology utilizing diffraction interference. Using this, it could be possible to get highly developed off-the-shelf products from other fields to make parallel processing more powerful. Apologies for the audio quality, the audio recorder data somehow got corrupted and I had to u...
Sep 03, 2018•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast I've been in contact with Lowell Thompson of the Learning with Lowell podcast for some time and have become a fan of his work. He also covers many things Biotech and Science sometimes even touching upon the Brain Machine Interface space. In this joint episode which is being published on both shows, we talk about some of the cool interviews and technologies we have learned about on the show. This may be a recurring episode with Lowell coming on once in a while to share what he has learned....
Aug 27, 2018•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast I was able to sit down with Robert Shannon to talk about his pioneering role with Cochlear Implants. It was an honor to talk to him. Unfortunately, there were technical difficulties with some of the microphones so we tried to salvage the audio as much as possible
Aug 13, 2018•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast At the 2018 Neural Interfaces Conference in Minneapolis Loren Reith talked about how he improved the Utah Slant Array
Aug 08, 2018•8 min•Transcript available on Metacast Joost saw a problem with data management in the scientific space so he set out to fix it. He also helped made cloud storage and sharing much easier with Blackfynn
Aug 06, 2018•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast At the 2018 Neural Interface Conference the first person I talked to during the poster session was Gene Fridman of Johns Hopkins who was presenting on the ability to block small nerves using direct current. Since they used ions there were no disadvantages compared to if they used metal electrodes
Jul 18, 2018•5 min•Transcript available on Metacast At a poster session at the 2018 Neural Interfaces Conference, I talked to James Eles about his poster on the in vivo imaging of calcium activity during electrode implantation. They were able to image the firing of calcium neurons many times higher than their usual levels which is a sign of damage In vivo imaging of neuronal calcium during electrode implantation: Spatial and temporal mapping of damage and recovery JR Eles, AL Vazquez, TDY Kozai, XT Cui - Biomaterials, 2018...
Jul 18, 2018•3 min•Transcript available on Metacast At the Neural Interface poster session, I was able to talk to William Huffman of the Warren Grill lab at Duke University about the reduction of invasive surgery using ultrasound guiding. This reduces the need for larger and more invasive surgeries which are of course much less damaging to the animal or the patient
Jul 18, 2018•3 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
