Papers

Moure, P., Granley, J., Grani, F., Soo, L., Lozano, A., López-Peco, R., Villamarín-Ortiz, A., Soto-Sánchez, C., Liu, Shih-Chii, Beyeler, M., Fernandez, E. Abstact Visual cortical prostheses offer a promising path to sight restoration, but current systems elicit crude, variable percepts and rely on manual electrode-by-electrode calibration that does not scale. These limitations reflect a deeper challenge: electrical microstimulation evokes nonlinear, state-dependent population

Valle, G., Oswalt, D., Gaunt, R. A., Roelfsema, P., Greenspon, C. M., Fernandez, E. Abstract The restoration of sensory function following injury or disease represents a critical challenge in neuroengineering. Sensory neuroprostheses, particularly those targeting the primary visual (V1) and somatosensory (S1) cortices, promise to bypass damaged afferent pathways and reintroduce sensory percepts through direct cortical stimulation. Building on foundational insights from non-hu

Alfaro, A., Soo, L., Waclawczyk, D., Morollón, R., Grani, F., Fernandez, E. Abstract We describe the case of a participant in a clinical trial investigating intracortical microstimulation of the visual cortex to provide a limited yet functional sense of vision to the profoundly blind. Prior to his formal enrolment, he was completely blind due to bilateral Non-arteritic Anterior Ischemic Optic Neuropathy. Following the initiation of brain electrical microstimulation experiment

Grani, F., Soto-Sánchez, C., Rodil, A., López-Peco, R., González, P., Fernández, E. Abstract Blindness is one of the most impactful disabilities in human lives. Cortical prostheses could one day restore functional vision in some blind subjects, but their success will depend on integrating advanced technologies to realize the therapeutic benefits they promise. Most previous studies in humans used electrodes only for stimulation, which has made it challenging to precisely contr

Fernandez, E., Alfaro, A., Soto-Sanchez, C., Gonzalez-Lopez, P., Lozano, A., Peña, S., Rodil, A., Gomez, B., Chen, X., Roelfsema, P., Rolston, J., Davis, T., Normann, R. A. Abstract BACKGROUND. A long-held goal of vision therapy is to transfer information directly to the visual cortex of blind individuals, thereby restoring a rudimentary form of sight. However, no clinically available cortical visual prosthesis yet exists. METHODS. We implanted an intracortical microelectrode

Chen, X., Wang, F., Fernandez E., Roelfsema, P.R. Abstract Blindness affects 40 million people across the world. A neuroprosthesis could one day restore functional vision in the blind. We implanted a 1024-channel prosthesis in areas V1 and V4 of the visual cortex of monkeys and used electrical stimulation to elicit percepts of dots of light (called phosphenes) on hundreds of electrodes, the locations of which matched the receptive fields of the stimulated neurons. Activity in