Description
Functional brain imaging is fundamental in the diagnosis and treatment of many brain pathologies such as neurodegenerative diseases and epilepsy. Among the non-invasive neuroimaging strategies, Electroencephalography (EEG) from scalp potentials is the most used. Unfortunately, this technique is not very precise because the skull is highly resistive and reduces the spacial resolution of the imaging.
The current standard techniques to get better images consist of implanting EEG electrodes under the skull (ECoG) or in the brain cortex (StereoEEG). Both these techniques are particularly invasive, since they require skull trepanation and cannot be practiced on large areas, thus not allowing a global imaging of brain activity.
The key part of the activity aims at developing a new brain imaging method, with a ECoG and StereoEEG-like resolution, but introducing a comprehensive brain imaging with non-invasive techniques. Classic non-invasive EEG will be improved thanks to a new instrument: the first ever existing contrast medium that will be developed by using innovative microfluidics, nanoelectronics and high-performance computing techniques.