Congratulations to Dr.Leigh Hochberg, Dr.Conor Walsh and Dr. Sabrina Paganoni who have been awarded the CERF Medical Engineering Prize for their “BrainGate+SoftRobotics” project.
Dr. Leigh Hochberg of Brown University, MGH Center for Neurotechnology and Neurorecovery, and Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Conor Walsh of the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Harvard Biodesign Lab.
Dr. Sabrina Paganoni of the Healey & AMG Center for ALS and the MGH Neurological Clinical Research Institute.
“We are delighted to announce the BrainGate+SoftRobotics team as the winner of this year’s CERF Engineering Prize,” said Hazel Cullen, manager of the CERF prize. “This important and groundbreaking work will change the lives of those living with ALS by giving them back some of the independence that is taken away by this awful disease.”
The winning team is working together to create wearable soft robotics that maintain the function of the arm and hand, and can be controlled entirely by a person’s intention to move. The soft robotic system, already in development, can detect subtle movements – for example, the partial flexion of an index finger – and pneumatically actuate a glove that quietly and smoothly completes the closing of the hand to grasp a coffee cup. The research team is working to combine the soft robotic technology with the investigational BrainGate system, a tiny array of electrodes that can sense and decode signals from the brain’s motor cortex. The team aims to use signals from the brain to drive the soft robotics, restoring people’s ability to reach and grasp.
“Soft robotics can quietly, smoothly and unobtrusively provide for either rehabilitation or restorative function for people with ALS, stroke or spinal cord injury,” said Walsh, the Paul A. Maeder Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. “Watching and listening to end users evaluate our soft robotic systems is incredibly inspiring. Their ideas and feedback continue to push the technology further and faster with an unyielding focus on developing portable systems that restore highest priority functions for people with tetraplegia. Our work with the BrainGate team is leading to a palette of coordinated technologies that will provide the right amount of assistance at the right moment for people with ALS.”
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Congratulations to PathMaker Neurosystems Inc. who have been awarded a CERF Medical Electronics Prize.
The CERF Committee and Judging Panel were unanimous in their position that the work by PathMaker Neurosystems Inc. presented potential applications in ALS that must be recognised and supported. Thus, the decision was made to ward PathMaker with a special CERF Prize for Medical Electronics. The $250,000 award will be shared with the laboratory of PathMaker’s Scientific Founder, Prof. Zaghloul Ahmed, Chairman and Professor in the Department of Physical Therapy, and Program in Neuroscience, City University of New York (CUNY)/College of Staten Island (CSI), where the pioneering pre-clinical studies took place.
“We are tremendously honored to be recognized by CERF for our work and innovation in the treatment of ALS,” said Nader Yaghoubi, M.D., Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of PathMaker. “The therapeutic options currently available for those suffering from ALS are very limited. Based on groundbreaking work by Dr. Zaghloul Ahmed’s research group at CUNY/CSI, we believe our non-pharmacological and non-invasive approach represents a potential new modality for addressing motor neuron disease. We are also pleased to be collaborating with Sabrina Paganoni, M.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital and Healey Center for ALS at Massachusetts General Hospital, and J. Leon Morales-Quezada, M.D., Ph.D., Research Associate Director, Spaulding Neuromodulation Center at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital as we advance this technology into clinical application in ALS.”
“Our hyperexcitability suppression technology enables the non-invasive suppression of overactive motor neurons – this is an approach that has not previously been applied to ALS. We have already obtained very promising results in our pre-clinical studies, and these results have been presented at recent ALS conferences,” said Prof. Zaghloul Ahmed, Ph.D., PathMaker’s Scientific Founder, “We are grateful for the support and recognition from CERF for the work we are doing, which invigorates our efforts.”
“We are very pleased to see the exciting potential for application of neuromodulation to ALS”, said Hazel Cullen, Manager of the CERF Prize. “We hope that this support can facilitate efforts to move PathMaker’s promising technology into clinical application in ALS.”
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