A Wireless Electric Nerve-guide For Peripheral Nerve Repair
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$805,064.00
Summary
We aim to deliver a radical new precision intervention for peripheral nerve repair to improve the lives of people with peripheral nerve damage. Drawing from our recently awarded work on 'electric neural tissue engineering', we will pre-clinically test our invention of a unique clinically-amenable electric nerve-guide (e-nerve-guide), designed to act as a protective nerve conduit and wirelessly electrically-stimulate damaged nerves for their regeneration and restoration of function.
Facial paralysis results in loss of the ability to blink, which is the primary means of protecting and lubricating the eye. The eye becomes dry and ulcerated and eventually vision loss ensues. No therapy exists that can reliably restore blink and hence treatment is mostly palliative today. BLINC is an implantable device that artificially restores eye closure. It is wirelessly powered and readily implantable. BLINC has achieved eye closure similar to natural blinking in human cadaveric models.