The primary mission of NSEL is to advance neuroinformatics science by engineering new theoretical, computational and experimental tools for neuroscience research and clinical applications.
To achieve these objectives, NSEL focuses on a multitude of applications where micro and nanofabrication technologies have made substantial advances in building large-scale microelectronic interfaces to the nervous system. Examples include, but are not limited to, cochlear, retinal, and intra-cortical implants. A critical aspect in engineering these interfaces is real-time, sustainable operation in living brain tissue under severe implantability constraints. This research requires interdisciplinary expertise in statistical signal processing, information theory, integrated circuit design, materials science, and clinical neurophysiology. In the short term, NSEL efforts are focused on Brain Machine Interface (BMI) applications to provide real-time control of assistive devices for persons with severe motor disability. Over the long term, NSEL research seeks to utilize the developed tools to build adequate models of neural connectivity at multiple temporal and spatial scales, refine existing ones, and validate these models experimentally to better understand the nature of the neural information processing mechanism. An ultimate objective is to integrate these models with systems biology to understand the role of molecular and genetic regulation mechanisms on neural regeneration, growth and connectivity at the single cell, population and network levels.