SBIR Phase I: Analog front end (AFE) platform for lightweight, long-term cortical monitoring

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is to demonstrate the feasibility of an intelligent, wearable electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring and analytics platform as a remote seizure detection system. Epilepsy is a neurological disorder affecting 50 million people of all ages globally. Over 3 million people in the U.S. are affected with 150,000 new cases diagnosed each year. However, identifying and characterizing the type of seizure can be costly. EEGs record the electrical activity of the brain and can be used for epilepsy diagnosis. Today, this test is administered in a hospital setting and the patient is monitored continuously for several days. This project will enable the end-to-end system development of a robust, lightweight, wireless EEG cap to transmit signals remotely to a server, which will generate reports for the physician to analyze a patient neurological data for treatment. The proposed technology is a long-term, lightweight ambulatory seizure monitoring system offering advantages, including 1) Patients no longer have to endure long hospital stays, 2) More seizure instances can be detected outside clinical settings, and 3) Costs of ongoing monitoring are lowered. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will: (1) demonstrate that a proposed Analog Front End (AFE) is the most noise-power efficient in the EEG band (1-100 Hz) compared to benchmarks; (2) develop a system power budget to optimize signal processing in a low-power environment; and (3) perform signal integrity analysis of error sources (electronic noise, mains power interference, etc.) to optimize performance. The AFE is the foundation of a proposed portable electroencephalograph (EEG) device for neurological data acquisition for the clinical, academic, and research communities. This system will extend the current rise of digital health devices into the complex environment of neurological states, as well as advancing new neuro-analytic systems. 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.