Biomedical Commons^™

Algorithm For Premature Ventricular Contraction Detection From A Subcutaneous Electrocardiogram Signal, Iris Lynn Shelly

Dissertations and Theses

Cardiac arrhythmias occur when the normal pattern of electrical signals in the heart breaks down. A premature ventricular contraction (PVC) is a common type of arrhythmia that occurs when a heartbeat originates from an ectopic focus within the ventricles rather than from the sinus node in the right atrium. This and other arrhythmias are often diagnosed with the help of an electrocardiogram, or ECG, which records the electrical activity of the heart using electrodes placed on the skin. In an ECG signal, a PVC is characterized by both timing and morphological differences from a normal sinus beat.

An implantable cardiac …

Safe Haptics-Enabled Patient-Robot Interaction For Robotic And Telerobotic Rehabilitation Of Neuromuscular Disorders: Control Design And Analysis, Seyed Farokh Atashzar

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Motivation: Current statistics show that the population of seniors and the incidence rate of age-related neuromuscular disorders are rapidly increasing worldwide. Improving medical care is likely to increase the survival rate but will result in even more patients in need of Assistive, Rehabilitation and Assessment (ARA) services for extended periods which will place a significant burden on the world's healthcare systems. In many cases, the only alternative is limited and often delayed outpatient therapy. The situation will be worse for patients in remote areas. One potential solution is to develop technologies that provide efficient and safe means of in-hospital and …

An Emg-Based Patient Monitoring System Using Zynq Soc Device, Farhad Fallahlalehzari

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis describes the design, development, and testing of an EMG-based patient monitoring system using the Zynq device. Zynq is a system on chip device designed by Xilinx which consists of an ARM dual cortex-A9 processor as well as an FPGA integrated into one chip. This work also analyzes the performance of image-processing algorithms on this system and compares that performance to more traditional PC-based systems. Image processing algorithms, such as Sobel edge detection, dilation and erosion, could be used in conjunction with a camera for the patient monitoring purposes. These algorithms often perform sub-optimally on processors because of their …

A Multi-Channel 3d-Printed Bioreactor For Evaluation Of Growth And Production In The Microalga Dunaliella Sp, Cristian A. Cox

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

We explored the capabilities of additive manufacturing using a photo-cured jetted material 3D printer to manufacture a milli-microfluidic device with direct application in microalgae Dunaliella sp growth and intracellular compounds biosynthesis tests. A continuous microbioreactor for microalgae culture was CAD designed and successfully built in 1 hour and 49 minutes using black photopolymer cured by UV and a support material. The microreactor was made up of 2 parts including the bioreactor itself and a microchannel network for culture media fluids and microalgae. Both parts were assembled to form a single unit. Additional optical and auxiliar components were added. An external …

The Effects Of Cryopreservation On Human Dental Pulp-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells, Allison Elaine Tomlin

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Many studies have demonstrated clinical applications for the use of dental pulp stem cells (DPSC) for the treatment of various conditions. This has driven medical and scientific interest in the collection, isolation and banking of DPSC tissues for research into these potential therapies. Few studies to date have evaluated the viability of DPSC following long-term cryopreservation. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of cryopreservation on dental pulp-derived stem cells (DPSC) viability over a period of three years. Dental pulp-derived stem cells were isolated and cultured from thirty-one healthy teeth. DPSC isolates were assessed for doubling-time and …

Radiation Therapy And Dosing Material Transport Methodology, Robert O'Brien

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

A technique is examined here that utilizes high energy beta decays from a short lived radioisotope to treat medical conditions such as shallow cancerous lesions. A major benefit of beta particle interaction in tissue is a fixed penetration depth for the charged particle, with dose limited to the ultimate range of the beta particle. This method improves on some current techniques of radioactive brachytherapy, where "seeds" are placed inside patients through temporary or permanent implantation in order to kill cancerous cells or inhibit growth of tissue. The use of low energy gamma-rays is the most common method of treatment currently …

Approaches For Capturing Time-Varying Functional Network Connectivity With Application To Normative Development And Mental Illness, Barnaly Rashid

Electrical and Computer Engineering ETDs

Since the beginning of medical science, the human brain has remained an unsolved puzzle; an illusive organ that controls everything- from breathing to heartbeats, from emotion to anger, and more. With the power of advanced neuroimaging techniques, scientists have now started to solve this nearly impossible puzzle, piece by piece. Over the past decade, various in vivo techniques, including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), have been increasingly used to understand brain functions. fMRI is extensively being used to facilitate the identification of various neuropsychological disorders such as schizophrenia (SZ), bipolar disorder (BP) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). These disorders are …

Design And Development Of Smart Brain-Machine-Brain Interface (Sbmibi) For Deep Brain Stimulation And Other Biomedical Applications, Muhammad S. Khan

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Machine collaboration with the biological body/brain by sending electrical information back and forth is one of the leading research areas in neuro-engineering during the twenty-first century. Hence, Brain-Machine-Brain Interface (BMBI) is a powerful tool for achieving such machine-brain/body collaboration. BMBI generally is a smart device (usually invasive) that can record, store, and analyze neural activities, and generate corresponding responses in the form of electrical pulses to stimulate specific brain regions. The Smart Brain-Machine-Brain-Interface (SBMBI) is a step forward with compared to the traditional BMBI by including smart functions, such as in-electrode local computing capabilities, and availability of cloud connectivity in …

A Biologically Plausible Supervised Learning Method For Spiking Neurons With Real-World Applications, Lilin Guo

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Learning is central to infusing intelligence to any biologically inspired system. This study introduces a novel Cross-Correlated Delay Shift (CCDS) learning method for spiking neurons with the ability to learn and reproduce arbitrary spike patterns in a supervised fashion with applicability tospatiotemporalinformation encoded at the precise timing of spikes. By integrating the cross-correlated term,axonaland synapse delays, the CCDS rule is proven to be both biologically plausible and computationally efficient. The proposed learning algorithm is evaluated in terms of reliability, adaptive learning performance, generality to different neuron models, learning in the presence of noise, effects of its learning parameters and classification …

Behavior Classification Using Multi-Site Lfp And Ecog Signals, Adam O. Hebb, Hosein M. Golshan, Sara J. Hanrahan, Joshua Nedrud, Mohammad H. Mahoor

Electrical and Computer Engineering: Graduate Student Scholarship

Abstract-Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) is an effective therapy that alleviates the motor signs of Parkinson’s disease (PD). Existing DBS is open loop, providing a time invariant stimulation pulse train that may generate cognitive, speech, and balance side effects. A closed-loop DBS system that utilizes appropriate physiological control variables may improve therapeutic results, reduce stimulation side effects, and extend battery life of pulse generators. Furthermore, by customizing DBS to a patient’s behavioral goal, side effects of stimulation may arise only when they are non-detrimental to the patient’s current goals. Therefore, classification of human behavior using physiological signals is an …

Gait And Tremor Assessment For Patients With Parkinson’S Disease Using Wearable Sensors, Shyam V. Perumal, Ravi Sankar

Electrical Engineering Faculty Publications

Typically, subjects with Parkinson’s disease (PD) display instances of tremor at an early stage of the disease and later on develop gait impairments and postural instability. In this research, we have investigated the effect of using both gait and tremor features for an early detection and monitoring of PD. Various features were extracted from the data collected from the wearable sensors and further analyzed using statistical analysis and machine learning techniques to find the most significant features that would best distinguish between the two groups: subjects with PD and healthy control subjects. The analysis of our results shows that the …

Synchronization Of Coupled Neurons Via Robust Feedback, Hector Puebla, Ricardo Aguilar-Lopez, Priti Kumar Roy

Annual Symposium on Biomathematics and Ecology Education and Research

No abstract provided.

Controlling And Processing Core For Wireless Implantable Telemetry System, Naeeme Modir

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Wireless implantable telemetry systems are suitable choices for monitoring various physiological parameters such as blood pressure and volume. These systems typically compose of an internal device implanted into a living body captures the physiological data and sends them to an external base station located outside of the body for further processing. The internal device usually consists of a sensor interface to convert the collected data to electrical signals; a digital core to digitize the analog signals, process them and prepare them for transmission; an RF front-end to transmit the data outside the body and to receive the required commands from …

Ionic Basis Of Ventricular Action Potentials, Ariel L. Escobar

Science Seminar Series

Dr. Escobar will talk about his cutting-edge approach to understanding molecular mechanisms underlying electrical activity in the heart.

Shape Memory Alloy Actuators And Sensors For Applications In Minimally Invasive Interventions, Amit Srivastava

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Reduced access size in minimally invasive surgery and therapy (MIST) poses several restriction on the design of the dexterous robotic instruments. The instruments should be developed that are slender enough to pass through the small sized incisions and able to effectively operate in a compact workspace. Most existing robotic instruments are operated by big actuators, located outside the patient’s body, that transfer forces to the end effector via cables or magnetically controlled actuation mechanism. These instruments are certainly far from optimal in terms of their cost and the space they require in operating room. The lack of adequate sensing technologies …

New Tools For Viscoelastic Spectral Analysis, With Application To The Mechanics Of Cells And Collagen Across Hierarchies, Behzad Babaei

McKelvey School of Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Viscoelastic relaxation spectra are essential for predicting and interpreting the mechanical responses of materials and structures. For biological tissues, these spectra must usually be estimated from viscoelastic relaxation tests. Interpreting viscoelastic relaxation tests is challenging because the inverse problem is expensive computationally. We present here (1) an efficient algorithm and (2) a quasi-linear model that enable rapid identification of the viscoelastic relaxation spectra of both linear and nonlinear materials. We then apply these methods to develop fundamental insight into the mechanics of collagenous and fibrotic tissues.

The first algorithm, which we term the discrete spectral approach, is fast enough to …

Neural Representation Of Vocalizations In Noise In The Primary Auditory Cortex Of Marmoset Monkeys, Ruiye Ni

McKelvey School of Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Robust auditory perception plays a pivotal function in processing behaviorally relevant sounds, particularly when there are auditory distractions from the environment. The neuronal coding enabling this ability, however, is still not well understood. In this study we recorded single-unit activity from the primary auditory cortex of alert common marmoset monkeys (Callithrix jacchus) while delivering conspecific vocalizations degraded by two different background noises: broadband white noise (WGN) and vocalization babble (Babble).

Noise effects on single-unit neural representation of target vocalizations were quantified by measuring the response similarity elicited by natural vocalizations as a function of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Four consistent response …

Haptic Foot Feedback For Kicking Training In Virtual Reality, Hank Huang, Hong Tan

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) Symposium

As means to further supplement athletic performances increases, virtual reality is becoming helpful to sports in terms of cognitive training such as reaction, mentality, and game strategies. With the aid of haptic feedback, interaction with virtual objects increases by another dimension, in addition to the presence of visual and auditory feedback. This research presents an integrated system of a virtual reality environment, motion tracking system, and a haptic unit designed for the dorsal foot. The prototype simulates a scenario of virtual kicking and returns haptic response upon collision between the user’s foot and virtual object. The overall system was evaluated …

Mechanical Reliability Of Implantable Polyimide-Based Magnetic Microactuators For Biofouling Removal, Christian G. Figueroa-Espada, Qi Yang, Hyowon Lee

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) Symposium

Hydrocephalus is a neurological disorder that typically requires a long-term implantation of a shunt system to manage its symptoms. These shunt systems are notorious for their extremely high failure rate. More than 40% of all implanted shunt systems fail within the first year of implantation. On average, 85% of all hydrocephalus patients with shunt systems undergo at least two shunt-revision surgeries within 10 years of implantation. A large portion of this high failure rate can be attributed to biofouling-related obstructions and infections. Previously, we developed flexible polyimide-based magnetic microactuators to remove obstructions formed on hydrocephalus shunts. To test the long-term …

Simultaneous Behavior Onset Detection And Task Classification For Patients With Parkinson Disease Using Subthalamic Nucleus Local Field Potentials, Nazanin Zaker Habibabadi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to develop of methods for behavior onset detection of patients with Parkinson's disease (PD), as well as to investigate the models for classification of different behavioral tasks performed by PD patient. The detection is based on recorded Local Field Potentials (LFP) of the Subthalamic nucleus (STN), captured through Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) process.

One main part of this work is dedicated to the research of various properties and features of the STN LFP signals of several patients' behavior conditions. Features based on temporal and time-frequency analysis of the signals are developed and implemented. Evaluation and comparison of …

The Design And Validation Of A Wireless Bat-Mounted Sonar Recording System, Jeremy Joseph Langford

Masters Theses

Scientists studying the behavior of bats monitor their echolocation calls, as their calls are important for navigation and feeding, but scientist are typically restricted to ground-based recording. Recording bat calls used for echolocation from the back of the bat as opposed to the ground offers the opportunity to study bat echolocation from a vantage otherwise only offered to the bats themselves. However, designing a bat mounted in-flight audio recording system, (bat-tag), capable of recording the ultra-sound used in bat echolocation presents a unique set of challenges. Chiefly, the bat-tag must be sufficiently light weight as to not overburden the bat, …

Investigation Of Cnt-Induced Escherichia Coli Lysis And Protein Release, Abdollah Mosleh

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research investigated the use of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as a treatment to increase the permeability of a bacterial cell wall. Recombinant Escherichia coli BL21 (DE3) containing a plasmid that expressed Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP) and -lactamase were exposed to CNTs under various levels of agitation for different times. Fluorescence assay for GFP, optical absorbance for -lactamase activity, and Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) were used to determine the amount of released protein, and visually examine the permeability enhancement of the cells, respectively. It was found that more -lactamase was present in the culture fluid after treatment with CNTs in a …

A Novel Particle Filtering Method For Estimation Of Pulse Pressure Variation During Spontaneous Breathing, Sunghan Kim, Fouzia Noor, Mateo Aboy, James Mcnames

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Background: We describe the first automatic algorithm designed to estimate the pulse pressure variation ([Formula: see text]) from arterial blood pressure (ABP) signals under spontaneous breathing conditions. While currently there are a few publicly available algorithms to automatically estimate [Formula: see text] accurately and reliably in mechanically ventilated subjects, at the moment there is no automatic algorithm for estimating [Formula: see text] on spontaneously breathing subjects. The algorithm utilizes our recently developed sequential Monte Carlo method (SMCM), which is called a maximum a-posteriori adaptive marginalized particle filter (MAM-PF). We report the performance assessment results of the proposed algorithm on …

Development Of A Portable Cmos Time-Domain Fluorescence Lifetime Imager, Hongtao Wang

Doctoral Dissertations

Modern laboratory equipments to measure the excited-state lifetime of fluorophores usually include an expensive picosecond pulsed-laser excitation source, a fragile photomultiplier tube, and a large instrument body for optics. A portable and robust device to make fluorescence lifetime measurement in nanosecond scale is of great attraction for chemists and biologists. This dissertation reports the development of a portable LED time-domain fluorimeter from an all-solid-state discrete-component prototype to its advanced CMOS integrated circuit implementation. The motivation of the research is to develop a multiplexed fluorimeter for point-of-care diagnosis. Instruments developed by this novel method have higher fill factor, are more portable, …

Sonochemical Synthesis Of Zinc Oxide Nanostructures For Sensing And Energy Harvesting, Phani Kiran Vabbina

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Semiconductor nanostructures have attracted considerable research interest due to their unique physical and chemical properties at nanoscale which open new frontiers for applications in electronics and sensing. Zinc oxide nanostructures with a wide range of applications, especially in optoelectronic devices and bio sensing, have been the focus of research over the past few decades. However ZnO nanostructures have failed to penetrate the market as they were expected to, a few years ago. The two main reasons widely recognized as bottleneck for ZnO nanostructures are (1) Synthesis technique which is fast, economical, and environmentally benign which would allow the growth on …

Automated Microscopy Platform For High-Throughput Analysis Of Cellular Characteristics, Hussam Ibrahim

Physics: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

Existing microscopy platforms allow analysis post-hoc, but not in real time. This is an issue in the world of Bioengineering because you are limited to performing further analysis on specimen. The aim of my research was to design a sophisticated system whereby information can be exchanged between the software which acquires images and software that analyzes the images immediately after acquisition. In this system, images would be acquired by the microscope and analyzed by customized scripts (MATLAB, Mathworks) in real time. Specifically, MATLAB would wait for new images to be saved on the hard drive, import these images, and perform …

Microbubble Generation By Piezoelectric Transducers For Biomedical Studies, Mohammed Alkhazal

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Bubbles induced by blast waves or shocks are speculated as the major cause of damage in biological cells in mild traumatic brain injuries (TBI). Microbubble collapse was found to induce noticeable cell detachment from the cell substrate, changes in focal adhesion, and biomechanics. To better understand the bubble mechanism, a system needs to be constructed which allows clear differentiation on the impact of bubbles from that of shocks. Such a generator needs to be low profile in order to place under a microscope. A piezoelectric transducer system was designed to meet the need. The system uses either a flat or …

A Stroke Therapy Brace Design, Evan Kirkbride

Electrical Engineering

Victims of stroke often have difficulty with rehabilitation. With limited movement on their affected arm, patients often do not want to move much for physical therapy. In this project, we design a robotic brace that helps stroke patients move their arm more effectively in a reaching or pulling motion. By giving patients more movement in their affected arm than they would have otherwise, patients gain more from rehabilitation. The brace also adapts to the patient’s needs, providing more inclination or resistance as needed for their physical therapy. This kind of therapy engages patients rather than relying on their likely dwindled …

Exertion Control, Travis Taylor

Electrical Engineering

Current wearable fitness devices give the user after-the-fact fitness data, but little real-time feedback. Exertion Control, a new wearable device, continuously measures the user’s heart rate, creates a heart rate target, and helps the user reach it. This project completes the senior design and master’s thesis requirements and contains two milestones. The senior design product continuously measures the wearer’s heart rate and logs it with a user-friendly interface. This data models the heart’s exertion response and recovery response. The master’s thesis device refines the closed control loop with the user to give them a workout optimized to fit their needs.

Active Charge Balancing For Cardiac Stimulation, Maci Miri

Electrical Engineering

Worldwide, there are about 3 million people who have pacemakers, with 10,000 new implantations of ICD’s each month. [heart.org] Due to the gravity and importance of the function that ICD’s provide, these devices must be extremely reliable and highly effective. However, because of the high tolerances of IC manufacturing, stimulation circuits for pacemakers may be slightly unmatched and over time, may have a net DC charge applied to the tissues in the heart. Extra charge pumped into body tissues is dangerous for the patient’s health; the pH of the tissue can be raised and corrosion of the stimulating electrodes may …