Description

This issue of Microelectronics TOE covers recent developments in brain-computer interface (BCI) technologies for healthcare applications. Innovations profiled include BCI enabling sense of touch for disabled by the University of Chicago Medicine, speech recognition from neural networks by the University of Bremen, a bi-directional BCI providing sense of touch by the University of Washington, and an artificial neural network using memristors by the University of Southampton.

The Microelectronics TechVision Opportunity Engine (TOE) captures global electronics-related innovations and developments on a weekly basis. Developments are centred on electronics attributed by low power and cost, smaller size, better viewing, display and interface facilities, wireless connectivity, higher memory capacity, flexibility and wearables. Research focus themes include small footprint lightweight devices (CNTs, graphene), smart monitoring and control (touch and haptics), energy efficiency (LEDs, OLEDs, power and thermal management, energy harvesting), and high speed and improved conductivity devices (SiC, GaN, GaAs).

Miniaturization, a move toward lower power consumption, and the need for enhanced features are driving innovations in the electronics sector. Technology focus areas include semiconductor manufacturing and design, flexible electronics, 3D integration/IC, MEMS and NEMS, solid state lighting, advanced displays, nanoelectronics, wearable electronics, brain computer interface, advanced displays, near field communication, and next generation data storage or memory.

Keywords: Brain-computer interface, BCI, brain waves