| he study of the nervous system of various animal models can provide useful insight into human behavior and cognition, as well as facilitate in the development of therapeutic devices for nervous system disorders. To this end, new tools and methods must be developed in order to continue the understanding of how the nervous system functions, both at the individual neuron level as well as with the complete network. In this thesis electrical and optical measurement techniques and devices are discussed and used to make measurements from networks of dissociated cells. Deep ultra violet (DUV) polymer surface modification, microcontact printing (μCP), and inkjet printing are described and compared as methods for controlling cell growth on a given substrate. Electrophysiology instrumentation is discussed and successfully used to measure electrical activity from cultured neural networks in vitro. A low-noise, low-cost multi-channel amplifier was designed built and tested to be used with both commercial and custom MEAs. Both a 16-channel and a 128-channel amplifier were constructed with noise levels as low as 0.9 μVrms and 1.6 μV rms respectively, and for a cost of... |
