Modeling the effect of magnetoelectric nanoparticles on neuronal electrical activity: An analog circuit approach

This paper introduces a physical neuron model that incorporates magnetoelectric nanoparticles (MENPs) as an essential electrical circuit component to wirelessly control local neural activity. Availability of such a model is important as MENPs, due to their magnetoelectric effect, can wirelessly and noninvasively modulate neural activity, which, in turn, has implications for both finding cures for neurological diseases and creating a wireless noninvasive high-resolution brain-machine interface. When placed on a neuronal membrane, MENPs act as magnetic-field-controlled finite-size electric dipoles that generate local electric fields across the membrane in response to magnetic fields, thus allowing to controllably activate local ion channels and locally initiate an action potential. Herein, the neuronal electrical characteristic description is based on ion channel activation and inhibition mechanisms. A MENP-based memristive Hodgkin-Huxley circuit model is extracted by combining the Hodgkin-Huxley model and an equivalent circuit model for a single MENP. In this model, each MENP becomes an integral part of the neuron, thus enabling wireless local control of the neuron's electric circuit itself. Furthermore, the model is expanded to include multiple MENPs to describe collective effects in neural systems.