Electric Fields Of Pounding Heart Imaged By "Graphene Camera"

Jun, 2021 - By SMI

Researchers were successful in using the "graphene camera" for studying cardiac cells quantifying for only 10 μm within real time.

Scientists from the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) recently demonstrated one more use for the wonder material that is ever-versatile - graphene, when using it as a base for a modified sensor that is able to image electrical signals coming through the living tissues and cells in real time. This team's "graphene camera" was demonstrated for recording a beating heart’s electrical activity in action, this in turn could even disclose new capabilities of sensing with regard to the brain.

The scientists from UC Berkeley collaborated with Stanford University chemists for exploring the way this material could conduct a novel breed of medical sensors that are advanced. Researchers were successful in using the "graphene camera" for studying cardiac cells quantifying for only 10 μm within real time along with producing optical images of the dim electric fields that were generated from their beating. While chemical dyes an electrodes could be used for measuring the electrical activity within cells, it can only be done at a particular location, whereas the sheet calculates voltage across the tissue’s entire area. The team envisions joining the sensing techniques through recording the cell’s electrical signals while at the same time imaging dyed tissue.

This "graphene camera," also known as the coupled waveguide-amplified graphene electric field (CAGE) sensor, can be utilized for testing out drug candidates on heart muscles in advance of the clinical trials, to understand whether abnormal changes are triggered or not. This device could even expose novel possibilities within the brain’s direct sensing. Today, the Electrode arrays are utilized for studying the electrical activities in the brain cells, though it can only be done at a couple hundred locations. These strong sheets of graphene may possibly be placed upon the surface for gaining a broader depiction of constant electrical activity.