Awarded in 2026
Home Department: Electrical Engineering
Faculty Advisors: Subhasish Mitra (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science), E.J. Chichilnisky (Neurosurgery and Ophthalmology), Guosong Hong (Materials Science & Engineering), and Daniel Palanker (Ophthalmology)

Research Title: Customizable Penetrating Microelectrodes for High- Resolution Bidirectional Neural Interface

Advances in nanofabrication and neuroscience have enabled brain-computer interfaces with the potential to restore speech, motion, and sight. However, none yet can read and write at cellular resolution, as they are limited by 2D electrodes. Michael is developing customizable 3D microelectrode arrays for precise bidirectional interfacing with neural circuits, validated in the retina at single-cell, single-spike resolution. From the fab to the lab, he aims to achieve a principled replication of neural codes, starting with vision.