Project Overview

Challenge: Current DRE standard of care is either DBS (Medtronic, Boston Scientific), Vagus Nerve Stimulation (VNS – Livanova) or Responsive Nerve Stimulation (RNS – NeuroPace). These devices rarely eliminate seizures, and there is little to differentiate them from one another. Typically, median seizure reduction is 50-70% which, while statistically significant, does little to appreciably improve the patient’s quality of life. Patients still need to live with the day-to-day spectre of seizures, they cannot regain their drivers’ licence, they cannot independently care for children, or perform any other activities of daily living that present even mild inherent physical risk (bike riding, climbing a ladder, swimming etc.).

Solution: “”Elatus”” is a chronically implantable neuron-scale multi-electrode cortical array for the treatment of drug-refractory neurological conditions, beginning with DRE. Unlike low-resolution iEEG, our array uses unit-level spike data to measure brain criticality, which correlates with seizure probability. The electrode technology is derived from years of materials science research at the University of Melbourne. This is coupled with integrated circuits the team at the Université de Sherbrooke is designing to analyse these spiking waveforms and safely transmit this data to external systems. This capability means Elatus can provide much more “actionable” data to clinicians to inform patient therapies and more quickly and completely reduce seizure events. Ultimately Elatus will use criticality data to more effectively apply a closed loop electrical therapy, eliminating seizures far more effectively than current EEG-based closed-loop systems.

Expected Achievements/Impact: Patients with Elatus will be able to resume their normal lives, in most cases seizure-free. They will be able to re-claim their jobs, their ability to drive, their confidence in various activities, and cease to be a medical/social/financial burden to their families and society. Carbon Cybernetics will grow commercially because of this funding, providing high quality STEM jobs to the province of Québec.

Principal Investigator

Réjean Fontaine , Université de Sherbrooke

Team Members

Christian Iorio-Morin, Université de Sherbrooke

Ana Suller-Marti, Western University

Walter Hader, University of Calgary

Partners and Donors

CQDM

Carbon Cybernetics