Student Zachariah Sperry is working with an aplysia Californica (sea slug) at the lab of Tm Burns, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the UM.
These sea-dwelling invertebrates are a common animal model in neuroscience and neural engineering studies due to their relatively large nerves and ganglia. First Zach anesthetized the animal with an injection, and then he dissected out the buccal mass (mouth parts) and its attached nerve ganglia. Under the microscope the lab members observed the buccal mass moving, which is typical. The lab has worked with slugs to validate use of the electrode, and examine slug neural activity, prior to focused testing in our large-animal bladder focused experiments.
Bruns' lab performs in vivo studies to develop interfaces with the peripheral nervous system. In these studies they seek to understand how the nervous system works and to obtain functional control over an end organ. In general they focus on autonomic organs, including a primary lab goal of restoring bladder function through stimulation and recording from specific nerves.
May 9th, 2017. Ann Arbor, MI.
Photo by Marcin Szczepanski/Multimedia Director and Senior Producer, University of Michigan, College of Engineering
- Filename
- Business Photography_11.JPG
- Copyright
- Marcin Szczepanski
- Image Size
- 2000x1333 / 1.4MB
- www.marcinvisuals.com