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Catheter-integrated soft multilayer electronic arrays for multiplexed sensing and actuation during cardiac surgery

Nature Biomedical Engineering volume 4, pages 997–1009 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

The rigidity and relatively primitive modes of operation of catheters equipped with sensing or actuation elements impede their conformal contact with soft-tissue surfaces, limit the scope of their uses, lengthen surgical times and increase the need for advanced surgical skills. Here, we report materials, device designs and fabrication approaches for integrating advanced electronic functionality with catheters for minimally invasive forms of cardiac surgery. By using multiphysics modelling, plastic heart models and Langendorff animal and human hearts, we show that soft electronic arrays in multilayer configurations on endocardial balloon catheters can establish conformal contact with curved tissue surfaces, support high-density spatiotemporal mapping of temperature, pressure and electrophysiological parameters and allow for programmable electrical stimulation, radiofrequency ablation and irreversible electroporation. Integrating multimodal and multiplexing capabilities into minimally invasive surgical instruments may improve surgical performance and patient outcomes.

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Fig. 1: Multimodal, multiplexed soft sensors and actuators for minimally invasive surgery.
Fig. 2: Design, assembly and characterization of the array of 3D pressure sensors.
Fig. 3: Therapeutic functions.
Fig. 4: Simultaneous, multimodal operation.
Fig. 5: Multifunctionality of instrumented balloon catheters demonstrated with Langendorff rabbit heart models.
Fig. 6: Endocardial electrophysiological studies on Langendorff human heart models.

Data availability

The main data supporting the results in this study are available within the paper and its Supplementary Information. Source data for the figures are available from figshare with the identifier https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12631835.

Code availability

The custom MATLAB software for data analysis can be downloaded from https://github.com/optocardiography.

Change history

  • 10 September 2020

    The Peer Review file originally published with this Article was an old version; the updated file is now available.

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Acknowledgements

I.R.E. and J.A.R. acknowledge support from the Leducq Foundation project RHYTHM and R01-HL141470. This project was supported by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National Institutes of Health under grant nos. P41 GM103545 and R24 GM136986, and the Nora Eccles Harrison Cardiovascular Research and Training Institute (CVRTI). K.A. acknowledges support from the National Institutes of Health K99-HL148523-01A1. X.C. acknowledges support from National Key R&D Program of China (grant 2018YFA0108100) and China Scholarship Council. This work made use of the NUFAB facility of Northwestern University’s NUANCE Center, which has received support from the Soft and Hybrid Nanotechnology Experimental (SHyNE) Resource (NSF ECCS-1542205); the MRSEC program (NSF DMR-1720139) at the Materials Research Center; the International Institute for Nanotechnology (IIN); the Keck Foundation; and the State of Illinois, through the IIN.

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Mengdi Han, Lin Chen, Kedar Aras.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Querrey Simpson Institute for Bioelectronics, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Mengdi Han, Hangbo Zhao, Bohan Sun, Wubin Bai, Yuhang Ma, Wei Lu, Enming Song, Clifford Liu, Jeffrey B. Model, Roozbeh Ghaffari, Yonggang Huang & John A. Rogers

  2. Departments of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Lin Chen, Kan Li & Yonggang Huang

  3. State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China

    Lin Chen & Guanjun Yang

  4. Department of Biomedical Engineering, The George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA

    Kedar Aras, Ndeye Rokhaya Faye & Igor R. Efimov

  5. Key Laboratory of Mechanism Theory and Equipment Design of Ministry of Education, School of Mechanical Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China

    Cunman Liang

  6. Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Xuexian Chen

  7. Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Hangbo Zhao

  8. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Kan Li, Quansan Yang, Yonggang Huang & John A. Rogers

  9. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Kan Li, Wubin Bai, Yonggang Huang & John A. Rogers

  10. Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Kan Li

  11. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Bohan Sun

  12. Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign Urbana, Champaign, IL, USA

    Jae-Hwan Kim & John A. Rogers

  13. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign Urbana, Champaign, IL, USA

    Jae-Hwan Kim

  14. School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China

    Yuhang Ma

  15. Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign Urbana, Champaign, IL, USA

    Janice Mihyun Baek & Yujin Lee

  16. Department of Biomedical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Roozbeh Ghaffari & John A. Rogers

  17. Department of Surgery, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA

    John A. Rogers

  18. Department of Chemistry, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    John A. Rogers

  19. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    John A. Rogers

Authors
  1. Mengdi Han
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Contributions

M.H., L.C., K.A., R.G., Y.H., I.R.E. and J.A.R. conceived the ideas, designed the experiments and wrote the manuscript; L.C., K.L. and G.Y. performed mechanical, electrical and thermal modelling. M.H., C. Liang, B.S., J.-H.K., Q.Y., Y.M., E.S., J.M.B., Y.L., C. Liu and J.B.M. fabricated the devices; M.H., X.C., H.Z., B.S., W.B., Y.M. and W.L. performed in vitro data collection and analysis; M.H., K.A., H.Z. and N.R.F. performed ex vivo data collection and analysis.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Yonggang Huang, Igor R. Efimov or John A. Rogers.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary notes, figures, tables and video captions.

Reporting Summary

Supplementary Video 1

Temperature mapping using the multiplexing circuit with proper grounding.

Supplementary Video 2

Pressure mapping on a porcine heart.

Supplementary Video 3

Electrogram mapping on a rabbit heart.

Supplementary Video 4

Temperature mapping during radiofrequency ablation.

Supplementary Video 5

Electrogram mapping on a human heart.

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Han, M., Chen, L., Aras, K. et al. Catheter-integrated soft multilayer electronic arrays for multiplexed sensing and actuation during cardiac surgery. Nat Biomed Eng 4, 997–1009 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-020-00604-w

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