Hot damn, this got a lot of points, but no discussion.
The basic TL;DR is that they figured out a thing that works really, really well as a neural implant material (a mesh). They spent a lot of time figuring out the ideal details for this mesh, and a bunch more time looking at how it interacted with the brain.
Here's some TL;DR from the bulk of the paper:
Normal implants have the issue that the don't move the same way as brain tissue, so anything that jostles the brain causes the implant to carve paths through the brain. Since this is a mesh, it moves with the brain.
Injecting a "normal" mesh, you just get a sort of tube of stuff where you injected it. Because of the shape of this mesh, it tries to uncoil; but does so slowly enough that it doesn't damage the brain tissue. One of the major points of the study is the specifics of this mesh (which is basically just an angle).
Because it's a mesh, neurons actually really like growing on it, so they form a bunch of handy connections to it.
One fun thing you can then do is grow brain tissue in the petri dish with the mesh, and you'll get something with real nice connections.
As an aside, this is actually the first paper that I went: "Fuck it, I'm going to read Science"; that it was actually so unexpectedly accessible has started a trend of actually reading the science behind things. I recommend it!
The basic TL;DR is that they figured out a thing that works really, really well as a neural implant material (a mesh). They spent a lot of time figuring out the ideal details for this mesh, and a bunch more time looking at how it interacted with the brain.
Here's some TL;DR from the bulk of the paper:
Normal implants have the issue that the don't move the same way as brain tissue, so anything that jostles the brain causes the implant to carve paths through the brain. Since this is a mesh, it moves with the brain.
Injecting a "normal" mesh, you just get a sort of tube of stuff where you injected it. Because of the shape of this mesh, it tries to uncoil; but does so slowly enough that it doesn't damage the brain tissue. One of the major points of the study is the specifics of this mesh (which is basically just an angle).
Because it's a mesh, neurons actually really like growing on it, so they form a bunch of handy connections to it.
One fun thing you can then do is grow brain tissue in the petri dish with the mesh, and you'll get something with real nice connections.
As an aside, this is actually the first paper that I went: "Fuck it, I'm going to read Science"; that it was actually so unexpectedly accessible has started a trend of actually reading the science behind things. I recommend it!