Interdisciplinary Initiatives Program Round 8 - 2016

Anson M. Lee, Cardiothoracic Surgery
Zhenan Bao, Chemical Engineering

Three-dimensional mapping of arrhythmogenic activity with high throughput and high spatial-temporal resolution at specific regions is critical for targeted therapies and patient specific diagnostic applications. No current technology can achieve high throughput, high resolution and anatomic precision with reproducible applicability in the clinical setting. We propose to fabricate an intrinsically elastic electronic sheet containing thousands of sensors that can map arrhythmogenic activity instantly on the beating heart during surgery with <100 μm spatial resolution and submillisecond temporal resolution. This elastic electronic sheet can be expanded up to 4 times of its original size to cover the whole epicardial or endocardial surfaces to provide a global activity mapping to roughly identify the arrhythmogenic region, and then relax to its original size to cover on the targeted region with high dense sensors array to further provide a high resolution mapping illustrating the origin of arrhythmogenic activity for therapies. Moreover, we employ intrinsically elastic materials to fabricate the sensor array so that it can form an intimate mechanical coupling with cardiac tissue through the polymer-tissue interface and deform with the cardiomyocyte beating, while recording the signal at the same region through the elastic property of the materials. Together, this technology will allow for greater individualization of mapping, study and treatment of arrhythmias.