Interdisciplinary - Better Healthcare

Title: Design of a low power Transimpedance amplifier (TIA) for analysis of structural behavior of DNA through Nanopore sensors

Brief Description of project:

• Nanopore are critical sensors, use to detect the small signal changes from a passing DNA strand through it and hence requires a highly sensitive low noise current to voltage amplifier for depicting the behavior of DNA.
• Predicting an accurate model of nucleotide in DNA is of key interest for many genome studies.
• A typical IA architecture consists of an integrator cascaded with a differentiator, along with pseudo-resistors buffer circuitry
• The objective is to design a low power TIA architecture for depicting an accurate structural behavior of the DNA on the basis of changes in current observed by the nanopore sensor.

Principal Investigator:

• Dr. Rajnish Sharma
Team members:
• Kulbhushan Sharma, (PhD Scholar)
• AnishaPathania, (ME Scholar)
• ChanderPartap Singh, (ME Scholar)

Funding- INTERNAL        Project Start Date - 01/05/2018

Title: Design of an energy-efficient analog front-end for neural recording applications

Brief Description of project:

• There is a great demand for low power integrated neural recording systems, capable of recording signals obtained from 100 to 1000 neurons simultaneously for real time prediction of spatial movement of limbs.
• Such systems also help in early detection of neurological disorders such as Parkinson, Spinal cord injuries, Epilepsy and Paralysis etc.
• Moreover, after performing necessary classification and feature extraction of signals thus captured from Neural Recording system, these can be used to develop neural prosthetic for the disabled person.
• A typical neural recording system includes different blocks like – acquisition, amplification, processing and transmission.
• The objective is to design an ultra-low power analog-front end comprising of amplification, filteration and Digitization stages for effective neural signal conditioning.

Principal Investigator:

• Dr.Rajnish Sharma
Team members:
• Kulbhushan Sharma (PhD Scholar)
• Preeti Sharma (ME Scholar)

Funding- INTERNAL        Project Start Date - 09/01/2018

WHAT IS THE PROJECT AND ITS UTILISATION

To develop a user friendly portable low cost wireless device for patients which can be under the surveillance of doctor virtually through the doctors smart phone/tablet/pc. It can be used in Ambulance, Rural hospitals, Home health care services for elderly, disabled and critically ill persons.

HOW IT WORKS

Smart and Portable Intensive Care Unit is a wireless unit, which work through Internet based technology equipped with Cloud based server, Special Video Trans-coding software, Virtual Private Network based fast, secured and low cost transmission, android and PC applications, Micro-controllers make it small and portable. With the system the patient will be under the surveillance of doctor virtually through the doctors Smartphone/Tablet/PC. Doctor can see the patients real time vital signs parameters, talk with patient or nearby health care staff, see the magnificent view of body parts like throat, eye etc., Plan or deliver the emergency drugs though the drug delivery system thereby resulting in an in-time treatment and immediate medical assistance to patient.

BENEFITS OF THE PROJECT

The project is specifically designed for Rural and needy population of India. Due to scarcity of doctors in India, currently we have 1:10000 doctor populations and there is a great issue of monitoring and managing the remote location patients and patients in ambulance. Even if the ambulance get stuck off in traffic, with the help of this system patient can get emergency medical assistance by specialised doctors.

NATURE OF WORK

Smart and Portable Intensive Care Unit has several innovative features which make it quite useful. First its portability, it is able to work in wireless mode, operating cost is low, user friendly applications.

WHO IS THE BENEFICIARY

It can be used in Ambulance, Elderly as well as disabled persons who do not have mobility outside the house, Home health care services, Rural hospitals, Mobile health care services, Medical Colleges, any other facility where the patient load is very large.

USP OF THE PROJECT

• Remote and in-site drug delivery and planning.
• Pain management switch and alarm (both in-site and doctors smart phone).
• Video conferencing with doctor and transmission of close and magnificent view of specific part of body to smart phone.
• Non invasive vital sign transmission to smart phone.
• Vital sign exception alarm (both in-site and doctors smart phone).
• Secured, fast transmission and maintain confidentiality of patient data.
• Low cost.

OTHER INFORMATION

Patent has been filed in India as well as internationally. It is also published in World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and we have received the International Search Report on which they have mentioned this system has novelty and industrial application.

Principal Investigator:

DR.S.N.PANDA AND TEAM

Funding- External        Project Start Date - 10/08/2016

Low power methods will definitely play its importance in the advancement of ultra low power digital VLSI design for recent biomedical technology, but these power reduction methods and their comparisons have never been surveyed so far. There exists a gap in the selection of best ultra low power techniques for designing of digital biomedical implants. The essential aim of this research is to fill the existing gap by doing investigation of various ultra low power techniques for implantable digital electronics by analyzing sources of power dissipation, power estimation and optimization techniques at different level of design abstraction layers, various technologies for low power design, comparison of low power design techniques and their applications in bio-inspired systems. The cochlear implant is one of the most required neural artificial designs in India. It is the most effective artificial design in terms of restoration of function. Being a most successful neural artificial design, cochlear implants have provided partial hearing to more than 120 000 persons worldwide. However a remarkable progress has been made in the development of cochlear implants but there still remains scope for improvements, especially low power and area design of the cochlear implant. Biomedical engineers have played a significant role in the design, integration and evaluation of the cochlear implant system, but the overall success will be achieved when cochlear implants will be available with less cost and good efficiency in terms of less power consumption.

Principal Investigator:

Ms. Anjali Sharma

Funding- Internal        Project Start Date - 05/06/2016

Broad domain – Medical Image Processing

Focused domain – Pre-processing, Classification of histopathological images as benign and malignant

Cancer is a foremost reason of death across the world. The most common cancers are ­of lung, liver, colorectal, stomach and breast. Histopathology is the process of microscopic examination and detailed analysis of a sample of the biopsy by a pathologist for studying the cancer growth. The input to the system will be a collection of histopathological images of tissue. The pre-processing of an image will be performed in order to enhance the quality of the image. Subsequently, the object of interest will be segmented. The useful features will be extracted and selected for further processing. After the extraction of the selected features, the suspicious regions will be classified as benign/malignant. Finally, the performance of proposed method will be compared with the other state of art methods. The outcome of the proposed work will be an automated cancer diagnosis system which would definitely be an aid for experienced pathologists by providing a second opinion for effective diagnosis in order to avoid false decisions.

No. of intern positions available in the project – 1

Principal Investigator:

Dr Deepika Koundal

Funding- Internal        Project Start Date - 01/11/2017

Broad domain – Data processing, MRI-CT imaging, Circuit design, power electronics, microwave designs and animal modelling

Focused domain – Data science and electromagnetics

Laboratory access at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US, Thapar University Patiala and Rajindra Government Medical College, Patiala

The project is envisioned with a target to genetically modification in cancer cells with radio frequency based treatments on tissue scale. Currently, the target is to develop a physical device to cause reversible electroporation in cell membranes followed by CRISPR to introduce p53 genes in liver cells.

No. of intern positions available in the project – 01 (Engineering), 01 (Pharmacy)

Principal Investigator:

Dr Nitin Saluja

Funding- External        Project Start Date - 01/11/2017