Low-Power 256-Channel Nanowire Electrode-on-Chip Neural Interface for Intracellular Electrophysiology

Intracellular electrophysiology is a versatile technique fundamental to cellular neuroscience usually performed through the challenging and low-throughput patch-clamp technique. We present a micropower integrated circuit (IC) for scalable, high-throughput in vitro intracellular electrophysiology with simultaneous recording and stimulation implementing all functions of signal amplification, acquisition, and control directly interfacing with electrodes integrated on-chip. The 2.236 mm × 2.236 mm IC in 180nm CMOS contains four 8 × 8 arrays of nanowire electrodes at 50 µm pitch deposited over top-metal on the IC surface, for a total of 256 channels. Each channel consumes 0.47 µW power for current stimulation and voltage recording across 80 dB range at 25 kHz sampling rate.