Drug Eluting Electrode

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Background: Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) offer tremendous material property advantages in electrical, thermal, and mechanical applications. This invention expands the capabilities of CNTs and enters the ‘bio’ realm of CNT applications - where the CNT array serves as electrical stimulation and read-out electrodes for neuronal interfaces. The key problem that is addressed is that current electrode technologies are too large for biocompatibility. Specifically, significant scarring occurs at the electrode penetration site which leads to rapidly decreasing performance over time and often complete neural degeneration - ultimately leading to a physical condition that is far worse than prior to the insertion of the neural prosthetic. The invention uses CNT arrays that are ‘collapsed’ into a densified ‘spike’. By leveraging the inherent mechanical stiffness of CNTs and allowing for the mutual impingement by adjacent CNTs to further enhance this stiffness, the buckling phenomenon should be avoided when the diameter of the array node is reduced to dozens of microns. The high conductivity of CNTs would provide comparable electrical performance with the existing metallic arrays such that established neuronal stimulation and read-out protocols would not need to be significantly altered. CNTs also offer a notable advantage that typical metal electrodes do not offer and that is the ability to be readily functionalized with peptides and other biological compounds that will be used to promote neuronal growth and adhesion between the electrode and the biologic tissues which will allow for significantly enhanced electrode performance in both stimulating AND read-out of neuronal signals.