RoaFiore Laura, Meyer Trevor, Peixoto Thaissa, Irazoqui Pedro
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD USA.
Department of Biomedical Engineering, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD USA.
NPJ Biosens. 2024;1(1):11. doi: 10.1038/s44328-024-00012-z. Epub 2024 Sep 10.
Vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is an FDA-approved stimulation therapy to treat patients with refractory epilepsy. In this work, we use a coherent holographic imaging system to characterize vagus nerve-evoked potentials (VEPs) in the cortex in response to VNS stimulation paradigms without electrode placement or any genetic, structural, or functional labels. We analyze stimulation amplitude up to saturation, pulse width up to 800 μs, and frequency from 10 Hz to 30 Hz, finding that stimulation amplitude strongly modulates VEPs response magnitude (effect size 0.401), while pulse width has a moderate modulatory effect (effect size 0.127) and frequency has almost no modulatory effect (effect size 0.009) on the evoked potential magnitude. We find mild interactions between pulse width and frequency. This non-contact label-free functional imaging technique may serve as a non-invasive rapid-feedback tool to characterize VEPs and may increase the efficacy of VNS in patients with refractory epilepsy.
迷走神经刺激（VNS）是一种经美国食品药品监督管理局（FDA）批准的用于治疗难治性癫痫患者的刺激疗法。在这项研究中，我们使用了一种相干全息成像系统，来表征在不进行电极植入或任何基因、结构或功能标记的情况下，响应VNS刺激模式时皮层中的迷走神经诱发电位（VEP）。我们分析了高达饱和的刺激幅度、高达800 μs的脉冲宽度以及10 Hz至30 Hz的频率，发现刺激幅度强烈调节VEP反应幅度（效应大小为0.401），而脉冲宽度具有中等调节作用（效应大小为0.127），频率对诱发电位幅度几乎没有调节作用（效应大小为0.009）。我们发现脉冲宽度和频率之间存在轻微的相互作用。这种非接触、无标记的功能成像技术可作为一种非侵入性的快速反馈工具来表征VEP，并可能提高VNS对难治性癫痫患者的疗效。
