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Neuroscientists, neuroengineers, neurosurgeons, and related professionals assembled online earlier this month for the 2021 version of the Neural Interfaces Conference. A spinoff of the original NIH Neural Prosthesis Workshop, this year’s virtual meeting was produced jointly with the North American Neuromodulation Society. The two-day event kicked off with an NIH/FDA pre-session co-moderated Disorde…

One of the signs that a new industry or industry segment is poised for growth is the emergence of new competitors to challenge the incumbent players in that space. We are clearly seeing that come to pass in the neurotechnology industry. The first neuromodulation industry segment to experience this was spinal cord stimulation when Advanced Neuromodulation Systems (now Abbott) and then Advanced Bionics (now Boston Scientific) challenged Medtronic’s dominance in that space.

Neurologists and neurosurgeons treating individuals with Parkinson’s disease have used deep brain stimulation to help hundreds of thousands of patients who do not respond to pharmaceutical interventions, such as L-dopa. But neuromodulation therapy has also helped shed light on the underlying cause of the disease, which in turn informs new therapeutic approaches. In 2018, Philip Starr, at UCSF developed an adaptive version of DBS that adapts its stimulation only when needed based on recorded brain activity.

Since the first spinal cord stimulation devices emerged more than 50 years ago, neuromodulation vendors and research institutions, have sought to improve the performance and decrease the size of the devices. One challenge confronting them is that larger electrodes, with greater surface area, provide better therapeutic benefit but more invasive implantation procedures. Several vendors, including Mic…

As is the case with other industries, the neuromodulation industry endeavors to select product names that are well thought out and increase the likelihood of patient and clinician acceptance. Medtronic’s AdaptiveStim and Tivic’s ClearUP are two examples that come to mind. But what neuromodulation vendors don’t often consider—and what they have far less control over—are the names of the neurological disorders that their products treat.

Neuromodulation researchers have looked at a number of noninvasive brain stimulation technologies as potential alternatives to DBS. The problem with approaches like TMS, tDCS, and tACS is the lack of specificity of brain targets. Recently, investigators at two U.S. institutions have reported novel ways of delivering ultrasound energy to the brain in a highly targeted manner. A multidisciplinary team at Washington University in St.

Neurotech Reports, in conjunction with the International Neuromodulation Society, is pleased to announce the introduction of our online database of neuromodulation products. This exclusive and comprehensive service is available to members of the International Neuromodulation Society and subscribers to Neurotech Reports. Now, for the first time, vendors of neuromodulation products can reach clinicians and investigators via the INS website and vendors through the Neurotech Reports website.

When Neurotech Reports began operations in 2001, the Internet had only been around a few years and the e-commerce industry was still in its infancy. Though we believed at the time that consumer and computer applications of neurotechnology would soon emerge (and we highlighted one early vendor in our first issue), we could not have predicted that three pioneers in the payment-processing industry would become major individual funders of neurotech firms.

Brain-on-a-Chip Technology Aids CNS Drug Discovery , senior technical editor Testing drugs that may have effects on neurons and brain circuits has typically required extensive in vivo experimentation in animals. Although in vitro testing on dissociated or cultured neurons offers an alternative to in vivo testing, these preparations lack the connections that occur within brain circuits, and single cells provide an incomplete picture of the effects of experimental compounds on the nervous system.

Two emerging neurotechnology firms have recently reported progress developing new therapies for stroke rehabilitation. But the two firms are using markedly different approaches. Neurolutions, Inc., a St. Loius, MO area startup, announced that the FDA granted de Novo market approval for its IpsiHand upper extremity rehabilitation system. The device has been cleared for use in chronic stroke patients to facilitate muscle re-education through its novel BCI platform.