A Wireless Implantable System for Facilitating Gastrointestinal Motility.

Gastrointestinal (GI) electrical stimulation has been shown in several studies to be a potential treatment option for GI motility disorders. Despite the promising preliminary research progress, however, its clinical applicability and usability are still unknown and limited due to the lack of a miniaturized versatile implantable stimulator supporting the investigation of effective stimulation patterns for facilitating GI dysmotility. In this paper, we present a wireless implantable GI modulation system to fill this technology gap. The system consists of a wireless extraluminal gastrointestinal modulation device (EGMD) performing GI electrical stimulation, and a rendezvous device (RD) and a custom-made graphical user interface (GUI) outside the body to wirelessly power and configure the EGMD to provide the desired stimuli for modulating GI smooth muscle activities. The system prototype was validated in bench-top and in vivo tests. The GI modulation system demonstrated its potential for facilitating intestinal transit in the preliminary in vivo chronic study using porcine models

Ambient RF energy harvesting and efficient DC-load inductive power transfer

This thesis analyses in detail the technology required for wireless power transfer via radio frequency (RF) ambient energy harvesting and an inductive power transfer system (IPT). Radio frequency harvesting circuits have been demonstrated for more than fifty years, but only a few have been able to harvest energy from freely available ambient (i.e. non-dedicated) RF sources. To explore the potential for ambient RF energy harvesting, a city-wide RF spectral survey was undertaken in London. Using the results from this survey, various harvesters were designed to cover four frequency bands from the largest RF contributors within the ultra-high frequency (0.3 to 3 GHz) part of the frequency spectrum. Prototypes were designed, fabricated and tested for each band and proved that approximately half of the London Underground stations were found to be suitable locations for harvesting ambient RF energy using the prototypes. Inductive Power Transfer systems for transmitting tens to hundreds of watts have been reported for almost a decade. Most of the work has concentrated on the optimization of the link efficiency and have not taken into account the efficiency of the driver and rectifier. Class-E amplifiers and rectifiers have been identified as ideal drivers for IPT applications, but their power handling capability at tens of MHz has been a crucial limiting factor, since the load and inductor characteristics are set by the requirements of the resonant inductive system. The frequency limitation of the driver restricts the unloaded Q-factor of the coils and thus the link efficiency. The system presented in this work alleviates the use of heavy and expensive field-shaping techniques by presenting an efficient IPT system capable of transmitting energy with high dc-to-load efficiencies at 6 MHz across a distance of 30 cm.Open Acces

Wireless Power Transfer Techniques for Implantable Medical Devices:A Review

Wireless power transfer (WPT) systems have become increasingly suitable solutions for the electrical powering of advanced multifunctional micro-electronic devices such as those found in current biomedical implants. The design and implementation of high power transfer efficiency WPT systems are, however, challenging. The size of the WPT system, the separation distance between the outside environment and location of the implanted medical device inside the body, the operating frequency and tissue safety due to power dissipation are key parameters to consider in the design of WPT systems. This article provides a systematic review of the wide range of WPT systems that have been investigated over the last two decades to improve overall system performance. The various strategies implemented to transfer wireless power in implantable medical devices (IMDs) were reviewed, which includes capacitive coupling, inductive coupling, magnetic resonance coupling and, more recently, acoustic and optical powering methods. The strengths and limitations of all these techniques are benchmarked against each other and particular emphasis is placed on comparing the implanted receiver size, the WPT distance, power transfer efficiency and tissue safety presented by the resulting systems. Necessary improvements and trends of each WPT techniques are also indicated per specific IMD

Master of Science

thesisFully integrated, implantable, and wireless neural interface systems typically re-quire a forward data link in addition to the telemetry link that transmits data from the chip. One popular way to create this forward data link is to amplitude modulate the magnetic fi eld of the inductive link that provides the device with wireless power. However, the limitations of these channels when loaded with a recti fier and amplitude modulated have not previously been characterized, and this lack of understanding caused previous versions of the Integrated Neural Interface (INI) to have forward data communication issues, which needed to be corrected for the next generation of the device, INIR8. This thesis first develops an analytical method of characterizing this sort of wireless channel. It then shows measurement data that verifies the validity of the model in the desired region of operation. The available bandwidth as determined by this analytical method, and confirmed by simulation, is insufficient for many applications. Therefore, the next subject of this thesis is to increase the data rate beyond what the bandwidth of the system can intrinsically support by using an equalization technique. This technique is shown to support very robust data recovery under a variety of operating conditions and to data rates much higher than otherwise possible. Another way to improve the reliability of data recovery is to develop a robust digital control system with error detection capabilities. This was done for INIR8, and works very reliably. The end result of this eff ort is a very robust forward data communication in INIR8, as well as a new analytical method for characterizing inductively coupled channels with certain loads and modulation techniques

High frequency electromagnetic links for wireless power transfer

This thesis investigates inductive links used in wireless power transfer systems. Inductive power transfer can be used as a power delivery method for a variety of portable devices, from medical implants to electric vehicles and is gaining increased interest. The focus is on high quality factor coils and MHz operation, where accurate measurements are difficult to achieve. Fast models of all pertinent aspects of inductive power transfer systems for constant cross section coils are developed. These models are used to optimise a new coil winding pattern that aims to increase efficiency in volume constrained scenarios. Measurement systems are developed to measure coil Q factors in excess of 1,000. The prototype measurement systems are verified against models of that system, as well as finite element simulations of the coil under test. Shielding of inductive power transfer systems is then investigated. A structure typically used at GHz frequencies, the artificial magnetic conductor, is miniaturised as an alternative to conventional ferrite backed ground plane shielding. Finite element simulation shows this structure significantly improves link efficiency. The artificial magnetic conductor prototype does not result in a gain in efficiency expected, however it does display the properties expected of an artificial magnetic conductor, including increased coupling factor. Finally, an unconventional inductive power transfer system is presented where transmitter and receiver are up to 6m away from each other and of radically different size. This system provides mW level power to remote devices in a room, for example thermostats or e-ink displays. Conventional approaches to design do not consider the distortion of the magnetic field caused by metallic objects in the room. It was found that treating the system as a decoupled receiver and transmitter provides a better prediction of received power in real world environments.Open Acces

A Novel Power-Efficient Wireless Multi-channel Recording System for the Telemonitoring of Electroencephalography (EEG)

This research introduces the development of a novel EEG recording system that is modular, batteryless, and wireless (untethered) with the supporting theoretical foundation in wireless communications and related design elements and circuitry. Its modular construct overcomes the EEG scaling problem and makes it easier for reconfiguring the hardware design in terms of the number and placement of electrodes and type of standard EEG system contemplated for use. In this development, portability, lightweight, and applicability to other clinical applications that rely on EEG data are sought. Due to printer tolerance, the 3D printed cap consists of 61 electrode placements. This recording capacity can however extend from 21 (as in the international 10-20 systems) up to 61 EEG channels at sample rates ranging from 250 to 1000 Hz and the transfer of the raw EEG signal using a standard allocated frequency as a data carrier. The main objectives of this dissertation are to (1) eliminate the need for heavy mounted batteries, (2) overcome the requirement for bulky power systems, and (3) avoid the use of data cables to untether the EEG system from the subject for a more practical and less restrictive setting. Unpredictability and temporal variations of the EEG input make developing a battery-free and cable-free EEG reading device challenging. Professional high-quality and high-resolution analog front ends are required to capture non-stationary EEG signals at microvolt levels. The primary components of the proposed setup are the wireless power transmission unit, which consists of a power amplifier, highly efficient resonant-inductive link, rectification, regulation, and power management units, as well as the analog front end, which consists of an analog to digital converter, pre-amplification unit, filtering unit, host microprocessor, and the wireless communication unit. These must all be compatible with the rest of the system and must use the least amount of power possible while minimizing the presence of noise and the attenuation of the recorded signal A highly efficient resonant-inductive coupling link is developed to decrease power transmission dissipation. Magnetized materials were utilized to steer electromagnetic flux and decrease route and medium loss while transmitting the required energy with low dissipation. Signal pre-amplification is handled by the front-end active electrodes. Standard bio-amplifier design approaches are combined to accomplish this purpose, and a thorough investigation of the optimum ADC, microcontroller, and transceiver units has been carried out. We can minimize overall system weight and power consumption by employing battery-less and cable-free EEG readout system designs, consequently giving patients more comfort and freedom of movement. Similarly, the solutions are designed to match the performance of medical-grade equipment. The captured electrical impulses using the proposed setup can be stored for various uses, including classification, prediction, 3D source localization, and for monitoring and diagnosing different brain disorders. All the proposed designs and supporting mathematical derivations were validated through empirical and software-simulated experiments. Many of the proposed designs, including the 3D head cap, the wireless power transmission unit, and the pre-amplification unit, are already fabricated, and the schematic circuits and simulation results were based on Spice, Altium, and high-frequency structure simulator (HFSS) software. The fully integrated head cap to be fabricated would require embedding the active electrodes into the 3D headset and applying current technological advances to miniaturize some of the design elements developed in this dissertation

High-performance wireless power and data transfer interface for implantable medical devices

D’importants progès ont été réalisés dans le développement des systèmes biomédicaux implantables grâce aux dernières avancées de la microélectronique et des technologies sans fil. Néanmoins, ces appareils restent difficiles à commercialier. Cette situation est due particulièrement à un manque de stratégies de design capable supporter les fonctionnalités exigées, aux limites de miniaturisation, ainsi qu’au manque d’interface sans fil à haut débit fiable et faible puissance capable de connecter les implants et les périphériques externes. Le nombre de sites de stimulation et/ou d’électrodes d’enregistrement retrouvés dans les dernières interfaces cerveau-ordinateur (IMC) ne cesse de croître afin d’augmenter la précision de contrôle, et d’améliorer notre compréhension des fonctions cérébrales. Ce nombre est appelé à atteindre un millier de site à court terme, ce qui exige des débits de données atteingnant facilement les 500 Mbps. Ceci étant dit, ces travaux visent à élaborer de nouvelles stratégies innovantes de conception de dispositifs biomédicaux implantables afin de repousser les limites mentionnées ci-dessus. On présente de nouvelles techniques faible puissance beaucoup plus performantes pour le transfert d’énergie et de données sans fil à haut débit ainsi que l’analyse et la réalisation de ces dernières grâce à des prototypes microélectroniques CMOS. Dans un premier temps, ces travaux exposent notre nouvelle structure multibobine inductive à résonance présentant une puissance sans fil distribuée uniformément pour alimenter des systèmes miniatures d’étude du cerveaux avec des models animaux en ilberté ainsi que des dispositifs médicaux implantbles sans fil qui se caractérisent par une capacité de positionnement libre. La structure propose un lien de résonance multibobines inductive, dont le résonateur principal est constitué d’une multitude de résonateurs identiques disposés dans une matrice de bobines carrées. Ces dernières sont connectées en parallèle afin de réaliser des surfaces de puissance (2D) ainsi qu’une chambre d’alimentation (3D). La chambre proposée utilise deux matrices de résonateurs de base, mises face à face et connectés en parallèle afin d’obtenir une distribution d’énergie uniforme en 3D. Chaque surface comprend neuf bobines superposées, connectées en parallèle et réailsées sur une carte de circuit imprimé deux couches FR4. La chambre dispose d’un mécanisme naturel de localisation de puissance qui facilite sa mise en oeuvre et son fonctionnement. En procédant ainsi, nous évitons la nécessité d’une détection active de l’emplacement de la charge et le contrôle d’alimentation. Notre approche permet à cette surface d’alimentation unique de fournir une efficacité de transfert de puissance (PTE) de 69% et une puissance délivrée à la charge (PDL) de 120 mW, pour une distance de séparation de 4 cm, tandis que le prototype de chambre complet fournit un PTE uniforme de 59% et un PDL de 100 mW en 3D, partout à l’intérieur de la chambre avec un volume de chambre de 27 × 27 × 16 cm3. Une étape critique avant d’utiliser un dispositif implantable chez les humains consiste à vérifier ses fonctionnalités sur des sujets animaux. Par conséquent, la chambre d’énergie sans fil conçue sera utilisée afin de caractériser les performances d’ une interface sans fil de transmisison de données dans un environnement réaliste in vivo avec positionement libre. Un émetteur-récepteur full-duplex (FDT) entièrement intégré qui se caractérise par sa faible puissance est conçu pour réaliser une interfaces bi-directionnelles (stimulation et enregistrement) avec des débits asymétriques: des taux de tramnsmission plus élevés sont nécessaires pour l’enregistrement électrophysiologique multicanal (signaux de liaison montante) alors que les taux moins élevés sont utilisés pour la stimulation (les signaux de liaison descendante). L’émetteur (TX) et le récepteur (RX) se partagent une seule antenne afin de réduire la taille de l’implant. L’émetteur utilise la radio ultra-large bande par impulsions (IR-UWB) basée sur l’approche edge combining et le RX utilise la bande ISM (Industrielle, Scientifique et Médicale) de fréquence central 2.4 GHz et la modulation on-off-keying (OOK). Une bonne isolation (> 20 dB) est obtenue entre le TX et le RX grâce à 1) la mise en forme les impulsions émises dans le spectre UWB non réglementée (3.1-7 GHz), et 2) le filtrage espace-efficace (évitant l’utilisation d’un circulateur ou d’un diplexeur) du spectre du lien de communication descendant directement au niveau de l’ amplificateur à faible bruit (LNA). L’émetteur UWB 3.1-7 GHz utilise un e modultion OOK ainsi qu’une modulation par déplacement de phase (BPSK) à seulement 10.8 pJ / bits. Le FDT proposé permet d’atteindre 500 Mbps de débit de données en lien montant et 100 Mbps de débit de données de lien descendant. Il est entièrement intégré dans un procédé TSMC CMOS 0.18 um standard et possède une taille totale de 0.8 mm2. La consommation totale d’énergie mesurée est de 10.4 mW (5 mW pour RX et 5.4 mW pour TX au taux de 500 Mbps).In recent years, there has been major progress on implantable biomedical systems that support most of the functionalities of wireless implantable devices. Nevertheless, these devices remain mostly restricted to be commercialized, in part due to weakness of a straightforward design to support the required functionalities, limitation on miniaturization, and lack of a reliable low-power high data rate interface between implants and external devices. This research provides novel strategies on the design of implantable biomedical devices that addresses these limitations by presenting analysis and techniques for wireless power transfer and efficient data transfer. The first part of this research includes our proposed novel resonance-based multicoil inductive power link structure with uniform power distribution to wirelessly power up smart animal research systems and implanted medical devices with high power efficiency and free positioning capability. The proposed structure consists of a multicoil resonance inductive link, which primary resonator array is made of several identical resonators enclosed in a scalable array of overlapping square coils that are connected in parallel and arranged in power surface (2D) and power chamber (3D) configurations. The proposed chamber uses two arrays of primary resonators, facing each other, and connected in parallel to achieve uniform power distribution in 3D. Each surface includes 9 overlapped coils connected in parallel and implemented into two layers of FR4 printed circuit board. The chamber features a natural power localization mechanism, which simplifies its implementation and eases its operation by avoiding the need for active detection of the load location and power control mechanisms. A single power surface based on the proposed approach can provide a power transfer efficiency (PTE) of 69% and a power delivered to the load (PDL) of 120 mW, for a separation distance of 4 cm, whereas the complete chamber prototype provides a uniform PTE of 59% and a PDL of 100 mW in 3D, everywhere inside the chamber with a chamber size of 27×27×16 cm3. The second part of this research includes our proposed novel, fully-integrated, low-power fullduplex transceiver (FDT) to support bi-directional neural interfacing applications (stimulating and recording) with asymmetric data rates: higher rates are required for recording (uplink signals) than stimulation (downlink signals). The transmitter (TX) and receiver (RX) share a single antenna to reduce implant size. The TX uses impulse radio ultra-wide band (IR-UWB) based on an edge combining approach, and the RX uses a novel 2.4-GHz on-off keying (OOK) receiver. Proper isolation (> 20 dB) between the TX and RX path is implemented 1) by shaping the transmitted pulses to fall within the unregulated UWB spectrum (3.1-7 GHz), and 2) by space-efficient filtering (avoiding a circulator or diplexer) of the downlink OOK spectrum in the RX low-noise amplifier (LNA). The UWB 3.1-7 GHz transmitter using OOK and binary phase shift keying (BPSK) modulations at only 10.8 pJ/bit. The proposed FDT provides dual band 500 Mbps TX uplink data rate and 100 Mbps RX downlink data rate. It is fully integrated on standard TSMC 0.18 nm CMOS within a total size of 0.8 mm2. The total power consumption measured 10.4 mW (5 mW for RX and 5.4 mW for TX at the rate of 500 Mbps)

A Class-E Inductive Powering Link with Backward Data Communications for Implantable Sensor Systems

The design and implementation of a wireless power and data transfer system based on inductive coupling, having the potential to be used in numerous implantable bio-medical sensors and systems, is presented. The system consists of an external (primary) unit and an internal (secondary) unit. The external unit incorporates a high-efficiency switch-mode Class-E amplifier operating at ~200 kHz for driving the primary coil. The secondary unit consists of a parallel resonant coil followed by the power recovery circuitry. Means for backward data communication from the internal to the external unit over the same pair of coils has been realized using a simple FSK-based modulation scheme incorporated into the internal unit. FSK demodulation and associated filtering are integrated with the base inductive powering system. Prototype system test results indicate the inductive link efficiency can exceed 80% under optimum operating conditions with the overall power transfer efficiency of approximately 30%. The communication system is capable of transmitting up to 10kbps of data with the FSK carrier frequency (i.e., middle-frequency) being only 120kHz. The complete system functions reliably over an inter-coil distances exceeding 2.5cm with a 5V dc supply

A Critical Analysis of a Wireless Power Transmission (WPT) with an Improvement Method for a Non-Radiative WPT

This paper describes the analysis of the wireless power transmission including recent progresses in non-radiative wireless power transmission (WPT) and the improvement methods. Generally, WPT transmitter side consists of a DC supply voltage source, inverter/power amplifier, transmitter impedance matching device (IMD), source resonator and primary coil. The WPT receiver meanwhile consists of the secondary coil, device resonator, receiver IMD, rectifier and load. In order to achieve an efficient WPT, the WPT transmitter must transmit energy with minimum loss at the receiver side.  This setup can be achieved by employing the power amplifier (PA). In this paper, the power amplifier in wireless power transmission for portable devices was designed. A Class E power amplifier was proposed and designed to improve the WPT transmitter side. The effects of zero voltage and zero derivative voltage switching on PA with optimization method was also discussed