Bionic chip can reproduce the behavior of biological neuron

British scientists have reported a new type of silicon chip, which can reproduce the electrical behavior of biological neurons, in a new breakthrough published on the 3rd of nature communication Using their methods, scientists are expected to develop biomimetic chips to repair the neural system's biological circuits that are abnormal due to diseases Scientists have spent years building chip models that look more like biological neurons However, there are still some defects in the attempt to simulate natural structures on modern silicon wafers Although the chip may be millions of times faster than anyone in processing some computing tasks, once the response activity of neuron chip is less than that of real biological neuron, it is likely that the final execution effect will be far from correct This time, researcher Alan nogritt and colleagues from Bath University, UK, designed a microcircuit to imitate ion channel, which can integrate primitive nerve stimulation and respond in a way similar to biological neuron The team then recreated the activity of individual hippocampal and respiratory neurons in a silicon chip Through 60 electrical stimulation as like as two peas, they found that the electrical responses produced by solid neurons were almost identical to those of biological neurons The researchers say that respiratory neurons, such as those they model, are responsible for respiratory sinus arrhythmias by coupling respiratory and cardiac rhythms Loss of this coupling due to age or disease is a prognosis for sleep apnea and heart failure They believe that a device that adapts to biofeedback like respiratory neurons may provide a potential treatment in the future.