1st Bernstein Sparks Workshop: “Towards long-term cortical neuro-interfaces” - March 06-10th, 2013
Interfaces that reliably connect the brain with electronic devices hold huge promises for basic research and medical applications. While there is encouraging progress, current technologies are still far from realising the vision of chronically and simultaneously connecting to large numbers of individual neurons enabling bi-directional information flow.
On the one hand, this would e.g. allow to carefully monitor cortical activity leading to progress in understanding brain functions and laying ground for long term neuroprosthetic applications. On the other hand, the ability to selectively induce specific neuronal activities will reveal yet unknown neuronal processes and can e.g. help to re-establish lost sensory inputs. To reach these objectives, numerous challenges, ranging from cutting edge basic research in neuroscience to novel technological developments from diverse engineering fields, have to be met. Besides basic problems of recording and stimulation, also problems ranging from biocompatibility via microelectronics to fluid-proof and flexible structures have to be solved. Last but not least, also the development of neuroprosthetic devices, e.g., replacing lost body functions, poses challenges for data analysis and robotics.
The aim of this meeting will be to bring together leading experts from these disciplines and research fields, gain an overview over most recent developments, enable fruitful exchanges and discussions, and last but not least identify interesting new directions of research. The specific topics to be covered include the neuroscientific foundations, neuro-electronic interfaces, integrated circuits for neural interfaces and complete recording and stimulation systems.
Besides talks by these main speakers, there will be plenty of time for discussions and poster demonstrations.
Confirmed speakers:
- James Barrese
- Ravi Bellamkonda
- Maysam Gohvanloo
- Reid Harrison
- Andreas Hierlemann
- Daryl Kipke
- Thomas Knoepfel
- Nikos Logothetis
- Yiannos Manoli
- Arto Nurmikko
- Maurits Ortmanns
- Jan Rabaey
- Gerwin Schalk
- Andrew Schwartz
- Cornelius Schwarz
- Florian Solzbacher
- Thomas Stieglitz
- Peter Tass
- Roland Thewes
- Ross Walker.
Registration:
Attendance is limited. If you are interested to attend, please send a corresponding mail to Agnes Janssen (ajanssen@neuro.uni-bremen.de) by November 15, 2012, also indicating whether you would like to present a poster. Free seats will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.
After successful registration, the HWK will get back to you about all further details, including hotel reservations. A registration fee of 150 € towards catering will be charged. Please understand that participants will have to cover their own costs for accommodation and travelling.
Organization and support:
Local organizing committee:
- Klaus Pawelzik
- Andreas Kreiter
- Steffen Paul
- Walter Lang
- Agnes Janßen
Organizational support:
Simone Cardoso de Oliveira, Kerstin Schwarzwälder (Bernstein Coordination Site)
Dorthee Poggel, Marion Daniel (Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg)
The workshop is the first workshop of the “Bernstein Sparks Workshops” series within the Bernstein Network for Computational Neuroscience (www.nncn.de), aimed at taking up new exciting topics that may pave the way for major breakthroughs in brain research, and providing a forum for intense discussions of these issues. It is also supported by Bremen University as "Excellence Workshop”. We gratefully acknowledge further generous support by the 'Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg' (www.h-w-k.de) and BrainProducts.
