The document proposes using ultrasound to power implanted devices that can stimulate nerves and transmit data via modulated nerve signals. This would allow sending data from an array of piezoelectric nanowire devices on the vagus nerve in the neck to a drug delivery system implanted in the brain. Ultrasound would convert to electrical pulses to stimulate the vagus nerve and encode data in the nerve signals up to 200 bits per second, allowing targeted drug delivery in the brain through neural communications.

1. Using Neural Communications to
enable Targeted Drug-delivery in the
Human Brain.
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Michael Donohoe TSSG

2. Overview
• We propose the use of ultrasound as a method of providing in-body energy
harvesting for an implanted stimulus device at a shallow depth of tissue.
• Arrays of devices containing piezoelectric nanowires can convert incident
ultrasound energy into electrical pulses. These pulses can stimulate a nerve to
generate a stream of modulated signals to deliver data packets to a more
deeply embedded receiving device.
• We model a stimulus system on the vagus nerve in the neck sending modulated
data pulses to an embedded, multi-reservoir drug-delivery system in the brain.
The maximum bit rate is 200 bit/s and the proposed modulation is simple on-off
keying (OOK) to create a stream of logic ``ones" and ``zeroes".
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3. Neural Data Communications
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Piezoelectric
Nanowires (ΔE)External
Ultrasound
Device
Skin/fat
Tissue
Connective
tissue
Fascicles
Nerve bundles
Propagation
channel
Propagation
channel
Electrode
Po
Ultrasound
Stimulus Pulse
Compound Action
Potential
Receiver
Drug Delivery

4. Vagus Nerve Drug-delivery
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Drug-delivery Implant
With Multiple Reservoirs
Nanodevice Stimulus Array
Neural
Stimulus
Pulses

5. Publications
Michael Donohoe, Sasitharan Balasubramaniam, Brendan Jennings, and Josep Miquel Jornet. Powering In-body
Nanosensors with Ultrasounds. IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology 15(2):151-154, March 2016.
Michael Donohoe, Brendan Jennings, Josep Miquel Jornet, and Sasitharan Balasubramaniam. Nanodevice Arrays for
Peripheral Nerve Fascicle Activation Using Ultrasound Energy-harvesting. IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology
16(6):919-930, Nov 2017.
Michael Donohoe, Brendan Jennings, and Sasitharan Balasubramaniam. Capacity Analysis of a Peripheral Nerve using
Modulated Compound Action Potential Pulses. IEEE Transactions on Communications 67(1):154-164, Jan 2019.
Michael Donohoe, Brendan Jennings, and Sasitharan Balasubramaniam. Deep Brain Drug-delivery Control using
Vagus Nerve Communications. Submitted for publication (July 2019) in Elsevier Computer Networks.
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