Les Séminaires du Lundi et NeuroSchool accueillent Sliman BENSMAIA, Professeur de l'Université de Chicago.
Lundi 19 Juin de 14h à 15h Ilôt Bernard Dubois
Exceptionnellement Inscription préalable requise (pour des questions d'autorisation d'accès) ici
Titre : Biological and bionic hands: Natural neural coding and artificial perception
Abstract: Our ability to manipulate objects dexterously relies fundamentally on sensory signals originating from the hand. To restore motor function with upper-limb neuroprostheses requires that somatosensory feedback be provided to the amputee or tetraplegic patient. Given the complexity of state-of-the-art prosthetic limbs, and thus the huge state-space they can traverse, it is desirable to minimize the need for the user to learn associations between events impinging upon the limb and arbitrary sensations. With this in mind, we seek to develop approaches to intuitively convey sensory information that is critical for object manipulation through electrical activation of sensory neurons in the nerves or in the somatosensory cortex. To this end, we leverage our understanding of natural neural coding to construct encoding algorithms for artificial touch.
Bio : Sliman Bensmaia is the James and Karen Frank Family Professor in the Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy and in the Committee on Computational Neuroscience. The main objective of his research is to discover how sensory information is encoded in the activity of neurons along the somatosensory neuraxis, spanning the senses of touch and proprioception, in primates. To this end, his team records neuronal responses, measures the elicited percepts, and develops mathematical models to link neuronal representations to behavior. Bensmaia's team is also working toward restoring the sense of touch in bionic hands for amputees, through electrical interfaces with the nerves, or for people with tetraplegia, through electrical interfaces with the peripheral and central nervous systems. A widely published author, Bensmaia has spoken at dozens of invited talks and symposia and holds five patents. He is a member of the Society for Neuroscience, the American Physiological Society, and the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
