A compact multi-electrode system to measure in vivo electrical activity in the olivocerebellar system

Abstract

In the Erasmus Medical Center (Erasmus MC) in Rotterdam a lot of research is done to investigate the olivocerebellar system, consisting of the cerebellum (motor behaviour) and the inferior olive (sensory input). The correlation and propagation of signals between both parts are of interest when investigating the influence of sensory input on the motor behaviour. To facilitate this research, a compact system to measure in vivo electrical neural activity in the olivocerebellar system spatially and over time is designed and described in this work. The designed system consists of three subdesigns: electrodes, electronics and a measurement set-up. It is small, compact and capable of measuring in vivo neural activity. The Delft Electrode Array proves its concept with four robustly mounted electrode tips, however the number of mounted electrodes should be increased. The Delft Analogue Front End, the electronics system with its custom measurement set-up, can - after only changing software parameters - measure up to 32 channels. Its bandwidth (-3 dB bandwidth from 0.3Hz to 30 kHz) is wide enough to measure sub-threshold oscillations (1 to 10Hz) as well as action potentials (up to 10 kHz).