System Overview

MiV-OH is a versatile, low-cost and accurate in-vitro electrophysiology solution based on the assembly of open-source devices, fully customized recording platform and self-fabricated micro-electrode arrays (MEAs).

Our approach involves a recording platform that is custom designed, made of standard, inexpensive and readily available materials. By incorporating a series of swappable custom PCB interfaces, the platform supports diverse MEA configurations of up to 512 channels. The PCBs involve corresponding footprints that allow the insertion of Intan technology headstages <https://intantech.com> used for on-site signal amplification. The signal is then collected by Open Ephys board <https://open-ephys.org>, an open-source system for downstream data acquisition. Our platform is designed with the built-in modularity to allow a seamless integration with electrical/optical stimulation devices and a variety of add-on modules such as on-board sensors and fluidic interfaces.

Apart from the recording hardware, we also provide a flexible MEA fabrication protocol based on standard micro-fabrication technologies. By uniquely utilizing maskless photolithography, our protocol greatly favors rapid prototyping and demonstrates in a range of MEAs of different electrode resolutions, sizes, spatial topologies and constitutive materials.

Through a native data analysis software (MiV-OS), we demonstrate the functionality of our system via stimulation and recordings of a range of neuronal cultures, from embryonic stem cell-derived neurons and dissociated hippocampal cells, to organotypic brain slices and 3D engineered tissue mimics. Given the modularity and versatility of our approach, a range of applications are also demonstrated, including conventional biochemical electrophysiology, concurrent recording and calcium imaging, and even long-term recordings up to 24 hours.

More information about our system construction, characterization and extended applications can be found in paper [1]. Our open-source managing software for data acquisition and analysis can be found in MiV-OS <https://miv-os.readthedocs.io/en/latest/>_.

Reference: [1] Zhang, Dou, Kim, Upadhyay, Havert, Kang, Kazemi, Huang, Aydin, Huang, Rahman, Ellis-Mohr, Noblet, Lim, Chung, Gritton, Saif, Kong, Beggs, Gazzola. ‘Mind in Vitro’ platforms: Versatile, scalable, robust and open solutions to interfacing with living neurons. bioRxiv, 2023, pp.2023-08