China builds the world’s smallest wearable brain monitor with a cortex-wide view
Chinese scientists have developed what they say is the world’s smallest wearable mini brain monitor that can track the activity of thousands of neurons at the same time. Weighing in at one gram (0.35 oz), the wireless “Airscope” is the lightest device of its kind and enables researchers to track a wider range of brain activity in untethered laboratory animals. The device was jointly developed by…
Chinese scientists have unveiled what they claim is the world's smallest wearable brain monitor, dubbed "Airscope." Weighing just one gram, this wireless device enables researchers to monitor the activity of thousands of neurons simultaneously in untethered laboratory animals. Developed jointly by Tsinghua University and the Chinese PLA Medical School, the Airscope is described as a mesoscope, an optical instrument bridging the gap between microscopes and macroscopes.
Unlike previous devices that required animals to be fixed or tethered, Airscope allows for free movement with a wide field of view, capturing neural activity of over 8,500 individual neurons in a single mouse's cerebral cortex. The technology, detailed in a Nature journal paper, could expand beyond neuroscience to fields like immunology and oncology, potentially offering insights into disease development processes.
The Airscope project involved optimizing optical, illumination, electronic, and wireless systems, with the team utilizing AI to design lenses and develop a computer vision model for tracking subjects in video footage.
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