Ultrasound-mediated neurostimulation
AssigneeInsightec, Ltd.
InventorsKobi Vortman, Shuki Vitek
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Various approaches to stimulating neural activity in one or more target regions associated with one or more brain diseases or disorders include transmitting the first sequence of ultrasound pulses to the target region(s); measuring a physiological parameter indicative of the neural activity at the target region(s) resulting from the ultrasound pulses; and based at least in part on the measurement, adjusting a parameter value associated with one or more transducer elements so as to achieve a target objective of the neural activity.
Claims21
A system for stimulating neural activity in at least one target region associated with at least one brain disease or disorder using focused ultrasound, the system comprising:
- an ultrasound transducer comprising a plurality of transducer elements;
- an imaging device;
- and
- a controller configured to:
- (a) receive an image acquired by the imaging device including the target region to identify the target region and a non-target region;
- (b) transmit a first sequence of ultrasound pulses to the target region;
- (c) cause real-time measurements of changes in blood flow corresponding to changes in the neural activity at the target region and the non-target region resulting from the ultrasound pulses;
- and
- (d) based at least in part on the measurements, adjust a frequency, a phase, an amplitude, or an activation duration associated with at least one of the transducer elements to cause changes in blood flow corresponding to desired changes in the neural activity at the target region and the non-target region,
- wherein the controller is further configured to compare the measured changes in blood flow against the desired changes in the neural activity at the target region and the non-target region and repeat steps (b)-(d) until the desired changes in neural activity are satisfied.
A method of stimulating neural activity in at least one target region associated with at least one brain disease or disorder, the method comprising:
- transmitting a first sequence of ultrasound pulses from an ultrasound transducer to the target region, the ultrasound transducer comprising a plurality of transducer elements;
- measuring, in real-time, changes in blood flow corresponding to changes in the neural activity at the target region and a non-target region resulting from the ultrasound pulses;
- and
- based at least in part on the measurement, adjusting a frequency, a phase, an amplitude, or an activation duration associated with at least one of the transducer elements so as to cause changes in blood flow corresponding to desired changes in the neural activity at the target region and the non-target region.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.