I-Corps: high performance ultrasound transducer driving systems

Award ID: 2306624

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of focused ultrasound technology. This technology could eliminate traditional surgeries and invasive therapy complications. This technology can also be made at a competitive price point allowing it to be more accessible, especially to clinics in low-income communities. This technology also removes some of the major performance barriers in the market. A proposed miniaturized ultrasound solution can be deployed in numerous portable applications, such as ultrasonic deep brain stimulator, which eliminates complications and cost of current treatments, and can be used in other emerging applications such as mental health treatments, without opening the skull and implanting electrodes into a patient's brain. This I-Corps project is based on the development of an ultrasound transducer drive system. Multichannel phased arrays and single channel power modules are ultrasound transducer drivers, which are used in a wide range of medical and non-medical applications. These drivers are very high in price, and they have performance variances. This innovation reduces the cost of these drivers with some performance breakthroughs, such as generation of sine or harmonic-free outputs beneficial for both medical and nonmedical applications, as well as the removal of the matching networks per transducer and providing an increase in the power limitations of each channel. This technology can be deployed in focused ultrasound medical applications to cure a wide range of conditions non-invasively, with these harmless soundwaves. The technology can also be deployed in other non-medical applications, where economical and high-performance drivers are necessary. The technology is supposed to be miniaturized to replace current severely invasive deep brain stimulation with non-invasive ultrasound version used for different neurologic conditions, such as Epilepsy and Parkinson. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

NSF Program Director: Ruth Shuman