Category Archives: General

Can heart beats really power cardiac pacemakers?

Posted on 06/11/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Baron von Munchausen

Today, I received a link (http://tweakers.net/nieuws/85353/hartslag-kan-pacemaker-van-stroom-voorzien.html) from Marijn, honorary member of the Biomedical Electronics Group, in which it is mentioned that researchers have found a way to harvest enough energy from a piezo-electric transducer so that a cardiac pacemaker can be powered from the heart itself. This would render the bulky batteries in the pacemakers unnecessary and the pacemaker thus does not have to be replaced after a couple of years because of a depleted battery.

I have two concerns about this. First, there is a kind of “Baron-von-Munchausen” effect. Baron von Munchausen was an 18th-century German nobleman, who, according to Rudolf Erich Raspe’s story The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen, pulls himself out of a swamp by his hair (specifically, his pigtail). Now, let’s suppose that a pacemaker, equipped with a piezo-electric energy harvester to power the pacemaker, for no particular reason, fails to operate and the heart stops its precious beating, what will then power up the pacemaker again to make the beat again? Scary thought, isn’t it?

Second concern is of another nature. Pacemakers are usually replaced, not because the battery has depleted, but simply because a next generation pacemaker can provide a better therapy to the patient. As a side note, uncomfortable but true, current pacemakers (and thus also the batteries included therein) on average live longer than their owners. Hopefully this latter aspect will change for the better soon.

Wouter

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Posted in Energy Harvesting, General, Pacemakers

Does enriched acoustic environment in humans abolish chronic tinnitus clinically and electrophysiologically?

Posted on 03/11/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Animal research has shown that loss of normal acoustic stimulation can increase spontaneous firing in the central auditory system and induce cortical map plasticity. Enriched acoustic environment after noise trauma prevents map plasticity and abolishes neural signs of tinnitus. In humans, the tinnitus spectrum overlaps with the area of hearing loss. Based on these findings it can be hypothesized that stimulating the auditory system by presenting music compensating specifically for the hearing loss might also suppress chronic tinnitus. To verify this hypothesis, a study was conducted in three groups of tinnitus patients. One group listened just to unmodified music (i.e. active control group), one group listened to music spectrally tailored to compensate for their hearing loss, and a third group received music tailored to overcompensate for their hearing loss, associated with one (in presbycusis) or two notches (in audiometric dip) at the edge of hearing loss. Our data indicate that applying overcompensation to the hearing loss worsens the patients’ tinnitus loudness, the tinnitus annoyance and their depressive feelings.
No significant effects were obtained for the control group or for the compensation group. These clinical findings were associated with an increase in current density within the left dorsal anterior cingulate cortex in the alpha2 frequency band and within the left pregenual anterior cingulate cortex in beta1 and beta2 frequency band. In addition, a region of interest analysis also demonstrated an associated increase in gamma band activity in the auditory cortex after overcompensation in comparison to baseline measurements. This was, however, not the case for the control or the compensation groups. In conclusion, music therapy compensating for hearing loss is not beneficial in suppressing tinnitus, and overcompensating hearing loss actually worsens tinnitus, both clinically and electrophysiologically.

2012 Published by Elsevier B.V, in Hearing Research, Hear Res. 2012 Oct 23. pii: S0378-5955(12)00244-4. doi: 10.1016/j.heares.2012.10.003. Authors: Vanneste S, van Dongen M, De Vree B, Hiseni S, van der Velden E, Strydis C, Kathleen J, Norena A, Serdijn W, De Ridder D

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Posted in General, Music, Understanding the Brain

Neurostimulation causes nerves cells to grow back and allows paralyzed to walk again

Posted on 27/10/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Article from De Volkskrant, dd. Oct. 27, 2012, entitled “Paralyzed walks again”

Eddy was damn right when after the disk in his spinal cord was removed by the neurosurgeon and he lost almost all the feeling in one of his legs due to the acute hernia. By means of transcutaneous stimulation of his foot and leg he was able to regain feeling and control over his muscles and walk again. The method was not proven scientifically yet, but obviously worked, as we witnessed from closeby. Now the scientific proof is there.

Exciting times ahead, if you ask me.

Wouter

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Posted in Electronics, General, Neurostimulation and Neuromodulation

Article in “De Telegraaf”, September 29, 2012 (in Dutch)

Posted on 20/10/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Artikel Telegraaf

Wouter

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Posted in Education, Electronics, General

We have migrated!

Posted on 21/09/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Dear readers of and contributors to the Biomedical Electronics weblog: we have now migrated to WordPress. This rather smooth handover has been completed yesterday and has resulted in a new look, but most importantly, a better user interface. Please try it out for yourself! I look forward to seeing your fine contributions coming in. Also if you have suggestions for the look and feel of the weblog, please do not hesitate to contact me.

As a noteworthy fact, this month one of our contributions reached 10,000+ views.

Best regards,

Wouter

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Posted in General

Dentist vs hairdresser?

Posted on 01/07/2012 by Senad Hiseni | 3 comments

Today I asked myself, what is the worst, a visit to a dentist or a visit to a hairdresser? Maybe some of you have a very clear answer for it but for me it’s not that simple. Let me tell you how I experience both of those two visits. Maybe you will understand my confusion…

Last week I went to a dentist. It was nothing serious, just a simple check up. Still, I am feeling happy that the visit is behind me, at least for the next six months. Obviously, like many of us, I hate those visits. They can be painful, usually there is blood and, it’s not the cheapest thing. Besides, the fact that somebody needs to look inside my mouth and do some kind of maintenance is not really a liberating feeling. However, I do go regularly. Why? Because, the trade off is reasonable, i.e. I suffer for a couple minutes during the visit and that, next to regularly brushing my teeth, is supposed to get me healthy teeth for a couple of months. It sounds fair enough and… there is nothing else that we can do.

How about the visit to a hairdresser? It is not even comparable, you would think. Hm… let’s see. Yesterday I visited a hairdresser too (yeah, both of them in a same week). To avoid a long queue, I went early in the morning. I was third in the queue and with four hairdressers this translates to 10 – 15 min. Not too bad. It is just enough to read a Story article about why Jennifer Lopez broke up with her husband. I barely finished the last sentence from the article and it was my turn. Right on time, I was thinking. So, I had to go and sit in front of one of those big mirrors. Grrrr… Why? Why do they need those mirrors? I don’t want to sit for 20-30 minutes and look to myself. It’s not like I can see what they are doing with the backside of my head and then I can stop them doing it. Anyway, while thinking about the mirror mystery I heard those words: So, how do we want it? Hm, first reaction in my head was: Short! Both, your talk and my hair! But, of course, I could not say that. It is not polite. I got my hair short but here is the talk:

Hairdresser (HD): So, you are very early this morning. Are you always so early?

I: No.

HD: Last week I came back from holiday; now I need to get up early again. I am still not used to it. Will you go on holiday soon?

I: No.

HD: Not on holiday? You need to work?

I: Yes.

HD: Will you go later then?

I: Yes.

HD: When?

I: December.

HD: Where?

I: Don’t know.

HD: Where do you work then?

I: Hm…

HD: I mean what kind of work you do?

I: (in my head… we had this talk last time and you had no clue what TU Delft is but here we go…) Electronics.

HD: Wow, must be difficult.

I: Hmm…

HD: Do you follow the EK 2012 championship?

I: No.

HD: I do. Do you know who is in the finals?

I: Hmm… Okay, I follow.

HD: Are you Dutch?

I: Yes.

HD: But… you have this accent?

I: I was not born here.

HD: Where are you born?

I: Bosnia.

HD: Is it hot over there?

I: It can be 🙂

HD: I wish I could move from the Netherlands to some other, warmer, place.

I: Hmm…

HD: Do you know Monique Smit?

I: No.

HD: She is a singer and a little sister of Jan Smit. Do you know Jan Smit?

I: No.

HD: No? He is very famous. Part of “inburgeringscursus” should go about Jan Smit.

I: Hmm…

HD: She was visiting a company my husband works for.

I: Hmm…

HD: I mean, Monique Smit

I: Hm…

HD: They paid her €1500 per hour.

Custumer1: That’s nothing. Jan Smit got € 7000 per half hour from…

Custumer2: bla bla bla bla…

HD2: bla bla bla bla…

Custumer3: bla bla bla bla…

Everyone: bla bla bla bla…

HD: Do you watch soaps?

HD: bla bla bla bla…

I think I switched off here, or fainted, or something else… Anyway I don’t remember it anymore…

So, what is the worst? Go to a dentist or to a hairdresser? Probably you don’t expect this answer but I still rather go to my hairdresser? Her picture would clarify my choice. 🙂

Senad Hiseni

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Posted in General

Motivation 2.0

Posted on 25/06/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Today, it was announced in the news that the Netherlands is again facing, now for the third time, a case of severe fraud in science. A professor in Consumer Behavior at the Erasmus University Rotterdam has resigned from his duties and two of his articles will be withdrawn from the journals they were published in.

Mark my words. We’re not dealing with intrinsically bad people here and before you raise your fingers at the scapegoats, read this [taken from the Book ‘Drive’ by Daniel H. Pink]: "Goals may cause systematic problems for organizations due to narrowed focus, unethical behavior, increased risk taking, decreased cooperation and decreased intrinsic motivation. Use care when applying goals in your organization."

It makes me wonder to what extent the universities are falling into the pits they digged themselves.

Wouter

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Posted in Education, General, Understanding the Brain

Mission Possible

Posted on 25/06/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | 1 comment

In order to present the Biomedical Electronics Group of Delft University of Technology to a couple of companies, it made sense to reveal our mission statement. So here it goes…

The mission of the Biomedical Electronics Group of Delft University of Technology is "to provide the technology for the successful monitoring, diagnosis and treatment of cortical, neural, cardiac and muscular disorders by means of electricity." In order to reach this goal we investigate and design circuits and systems for electrical stimulation, ExG readout, signal specific analog signal processing, power management/conversion, energy harvesting and wireless communication, to be applied in future wearable and implantable medical devices, such as hearing instruments, cardiac pacemakers, cochlear implants and neurostimulators.

So how about that? Reactions are welcome via this blog.

Wouter

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Posted in Electronics, Energy Harvesting, General, Medical Body Area Networks, Neurostimulation and Neuromodulation, Pacemakers

Excuse me, I am just a university professor

Posted on 10/06/2012 by Wouter Serdijn | Leave a comment

Loser The
economic downturn in Europe, often denoted as the Euro crisis, is often rightly associated with the negative effects of the "neoliberal meritocracy" we
live in. The term meritocracy perhaps deserves some explanation. It was
coined in the book of Michael Young, entitled "The rise of the
Meritocracy", which appeared in 1958 and sketches a world in which the
best, i.e., those with the highest intelligence and the highest work
power, climb the social-economical ladder very fast, and vice versa [1].

Also the universities, and Delft University of Technology
unfortunately is no exception, suffer under the yoke of this neoliberal
meritocracy, which has created an atmosphere in which professors only
become visible and respected if they have successfully competed with their colleagues
and have won an award, of which they subsequently advocate that it is
the most prestigious in their field.

Another effect of this
neoliberal meritocracy is that it all is about numbers that pretend to
reflect quality rather than that they are part of the quality itself. To me, the
best book ever on true quality is Robert Pirsig’s "Lila",
the worthy successor of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" (1974) and
which appeared in 1991. Naturally, an abstract topic like "quality" that
needs more than a book to give the reader a notion of its true essence
cannot be reduced to a number. Yet, in universities, the meritocracy
florishes due to numbers. In a self-assessment, made for the periodical
accreditation of our university, the quality of the research of its
professors was reduced to a number, in this case the Hirsh index or h-index. For a detailed discussion on h-index I refer you to the many web sites of Elsevier’s Scopus,
but for the moment just remember that it is a number that supposedly
indicates the influence of one’s scientific publications and thereby of the author himself on the field.
As if all fields are equally important, of equal size and all scientific communities
deal with their publications, authors, etc. in the same manner. Of
course not!

Quality of education of course is another aspect that
should be of concern to universities. Unfortunately, here the numbers
are more difficult to generate, if possible at all. As also education is more
inside-oriented and research is more outside-oriented and universities
would like to show to the outside world how great they are, they have a
tendency to stress the impact of their research more than the impact of
their education. Also, a university is an education institute of which
the major outcome, i.e., the student that successfully completes his studies
with a diploma on time and thereby is well equipped for his professional life to come, is a result of the great work of many individuals in a
team, including, of course, the student himself, but definitely more
difficult to trace back to the individual effort of a single professor. I
believe that, as a consequence of this more hidden impact of the
efforts of an individual professor, less appreciation exists among their
colleagues and bosses for the great work they are doing. Also, it is
striking to notice how many years must pass before a teacher that
clearly underperforms (according to which numbers?) will be no longer
able to pursue his damage.

However, this is also not my main
issue here. I guess my main issue is that in this meritocratic
university system there is no appreciation and thus no room for the glue
that keeps things together. To give you a few examples:

If a
professor falls ill and a colleague takes over and brings the expedition
to a satisfying close, this will most often go unnoticed as the project
or course officially is still under the wings of the original professor. You have to be
a loser to help your colleague in situations like these.
If a
student suffers from a delay in his studies due to lack of motivation,
skills or talents and he finally makes it due to the strong motivation
and commitment offered by his thesis advisor, whereas the thesis advisor
could
instead have spent his time on supervising at least two other more
brilliant students, according to the numbers, the advisor did the wrong
thing. You must be a loser to spend your time on less brilliant
students.
If a thesis advisor trains a student to let the creativity and the innovation come from the student himself rather than that he imposes his own solution to a
scientific or engineering problem on a student,
the result takes longer time to come to fruition and therefore requires
more time from the thesis advisor. You must be a loser if you don’t tell
your students exactly what to do and how.
If a thesis
advisor himself writes major parts of the scientific paper that is based
on the work of a student, this paper has more chance to be accepted for
publication and even win an award. You must be a loser to let your
student write his own paper.

If situations like those sketched above arise, I have accepted and even deliberately decided to be the loser.

Wouter

[1] Paul Verhaeghe: De effecten van een neoliberale meritocratie op identiteit en interpersoonlijke verhoudingen, Oikos 56, 1/2011.

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Posted in Education, General

Video’s ELCA festival ONLINE!

Posted on 03/05/2012 by Marijn van Dongen | 1 comment

Our loyal readers of this weblog have probably been waiting for this moment for a very long time and I am proud to finally present to the world: the video’s of the ELCA festival 2012!!

The festival was again a great success with many people attending. Besides the ELCA band (which is mainly composed of people from within our group), we had the honor that 3 other bands were performing: Ignoramus (where Cees-Jeroen is the lead singer), Three (where Wouter plays keys) and Rainbow (where June plays guitar).

Please find all the videos in our youtube channel or click one of the performances of the ELCA band in the list below:

ELCA Band

Tulpen uit Amsterdam (Part 1)

Tulpen uit Amsterdam (Part 2)