News
2024
February Read our latest article, "Development of a Feline Animal Model for Preclinical Research of a New Translabyrinthine Auditory Nerve Implant," in Frontiers in Neuroscience.
Yuan He, Abby Heiller, Grace Conchas, Kevin Jiang, and Inderbir Sondh attended the Association for Research in Otolaryngology Midwinter Meeting to present research about paired stimulation and the auditory nerve implant. Grace Conchas received a travel award to attend the Association for Research in Otolaryngology Midwinter Meeting.
January Hubert Lim was featured in an article in The Washington Post about tinnitus and bimodal neuromodulation.
2023
December Azaan Haider was awarded support for his research about paired stimulation from the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program.
November John Basile defended his thesis titled "Investigating the Safety Profile of Body-Coupled Ultrasound for the Auditory System and Tissue Heating during Stimulation."
August Gerardo Rodriguez-Orellana defended his thesis titled "Investigating the Effects of Body-Coupled Ultrasound on the Auditory System for a Novel Hearing Aid."
Adam Tuma bowled a turkey at Elsie's!
January The Lenire was featured in this AARP article about tinnitus.
2022
December SecondWave Systems was featured in this IEEE article about splenic ultrasound stimulation to treat rheumatoid arthritis.
November Adam Tuma, Anna Organ, Maryam Zebarjadi, Claire Kaiser, and Dzifa Kwaku attended the 2022 Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting in San Diego. They presented two posters, "Guiding Noninvasive Peripheral Neuromodulation Ultrasound Therapy Using Bone Echo Detection and Spleen Stimulation Targeting on a Wearable Platform" and "Stimulation of the Spleen with Electrical Pulses or with Ultrasound Energy from a Portable Therapeutic Device Decreases Cytokine Release in Acute Inflammation Rat Model." They also enjoyed exploring the conference exhibits, attending lectures, networking with professionals, exploring the city of San Diego, and visiting the beach!
October Hubert Lim—in collaboration with John Osborn, Ziad Nahas, and a total of eight institutions—was rewarded a $21 to lead research about vagus nerve stimulation through the Research Evaluating Vagal Excitation and Anatomical Links (REVEAL) project.
September Claire Kaiser won 2nd place in the neuroengineering area for her presentation of her poster titled "Treatment of Inflammation with Bioelectronic Medicine: Spleen-Targeted Ultrasound and Electrical Stimulation" at the Institute of Engineering in Medicine Annual Conference!
July Hubert Lim has helped lead a team that has published the results of a second large-scale study for tinnitus treatment. The work was highlighted at the University of Minnesota and Hearing Health and Technology Matters.
June Read out latest article—"Topographic and Widespread Auditory Modulation of the Somatosensory Cortex: Potential for Bimodal Sound and Body Stimulation for Pain Treatment."
Tyler Gathman received the Eivind Hoff Award from the International Hearing Foundation and Department of Otolaryngology.
Hubert Lim and M Health Fairview's Chelsi Dodd were interviewed about hearing loss in The Star Tribune.
May Read our latest article—"Quantifying Rheumatoid Arthritis Disease Activity Using a Multimodal Sensing Knee Brace"—sharing our work in collaboration with the Georgia Institute of Technology.
April Hubert Lim was interviewed on the Outring Tinnitus Podcast.
Hubert Lim presented at the Tinnitus Research Initiative Academy.
Claire Kaiser presented during the BME department Grand Rounds event on "Better pain therapy by leveraging remote technologies and biomarkers", with my talk titled "Biomarkers for monitoring efficacy of neuromodulatory treatments for inflammation and pain"
2021
November Hubert Lim was interviewed by Treble Health about the Lenire.
April Congratulations to Abby Heiller for receiving the MnDRIVE Graduate Fellowship in Neuromodulation for her research in Enhanced Hearing technologies!
2020
December Listen to Dr. Lim talk with the American Tinnitus Association on their podcast about the recent bimodal sound and tongue stimulation for tinnitus that was published in Science Translational Medicine.
December An incredible podcast episode on Skraps with Arun Sridhar and JoJo Platt interviewing Dr. Lim on his career pathway since undergraduate to his current faculty. They touch on different projects, personal experiences, and lots of interesting topics
November Check out the highlights for the tinnitus trestment research in JAMA and Nature Med!
October Check out the latest translational research by many key leaders in the tinnitus field together with Dr. Hubert Lim through his involvement with Neuromod Devices that was featured in the cover of Science Translational Medicine for their recent publication (paper). The paper describes the largest and longest follow-up clinical study for a medical device that treats tinnitus, which uses bimodal neuromodulation combining sound and tongue stimulation. The SONIC lab dedicated many years in pre-clinical animal research on bimodal neuromodulation to help push this concept to human studies. Excited to see the press coverage of the work, including in the Science podcast, Hearing Health Matters, MedTech News, Neuro News, Pharmaceutical Daily, Wall Street Online, Scientific American, Science Magazine, New Scientist, and IEEE Spectrum.
August Watch the recorded presentation of the UMN CSE Dean's Lunch and Learn, in which Dr. Lim is one of the invited speakers.
July Incredible new paper coming from our lab that has recently been submitted for publication. Checkout this preprint on using ultrasound to reduce inflammation, and potentially use this technology for the treatment of COVID-19.
June Research between SONIC Lab and SecondWave Systems may prove effective in a noninvasive treatment for COVID-19. Check out an exciting article on how the SONIC Lab is helping combat the pandemic.
March Congratulations to our lab members Indy Sondh and Abby Heiller for both being awarded the NRT Training Fellowship! This incredible opportunity will allow them to collaborate with members from a large community in the field of sensory loss.
Check out this incredible bio by the College of Science and Engineering of Claire Kaiser! The article highlights Claire's experience as a graduate student working with SecondWave.
January The SONIC Lab presented research on ultrasound hearing, the auditory nerve implant, and ultrasound safety at the ARO MidWinter Meeting.
Congratulations to Abby Heiller for being awarded the NRT travel award to fund her travels to the ARO MidWinter Meeting!
2019
November We had a great time hosting our DARPA UltRx collaborators and the DARPA Project Managing Team. It was an incredibly productive meeting, which allowed us to celebrate recent milestones as well as set goals for the upcoming months.
Congratulations to Claire Kaiser for her talk on collaborating with industry partners from a student's perspective, including advice and lessons learned at the MnDRIVE Retreat. She also won the first place poster competition!
September Our company collaborators at Ultran have won a $3.35 million DARPA SBIR award. Together, we will be starting a new company (SecondWave) to create a low-cost ultrasound plataform for neuromodulation and end-organ stimulation. Congratulations!
Congratulations to Claire Kaiser and Abby Heiller for passing their Oral Preliminary Exams! They are officially Doctoral Candidates.
August Congratulations to Claire Kaiser for being awarded a second year of funding by the Neuroimaging T32 Training grant! Also, congratulations to Gerardo Rodriguez for also renewing for a second year of funding the NRT Fellowship!
July Check out the new auto-commentary that the SONIC lab has published in collaboration with GE discussing the clinical applications of peripheral ultrasound stimulation.
June An article in JAMA highlights our research into ultrasound neuromodulation of the spleen to treat disease.
Our research into ultrasound stimulation of the spleen to treat arthritis was mentioned in the June edition of Scientfic American Magazine. See Gholipou, Bahar. "Sonic Therapy" Scientific American, June 2019: 14. Print.
May Check out the new article in Science Translational Medicine about the SONIC lab's research into treating inflammatory arthritis!
April Congratulations to Claire and Dan for placing 2nd in the Neuromodulation Symposium poster competition!
Congratulations to Claire and Abby for placing 3rd in the Medical Devices category at the IEM poster awards!
Congratulations to Abby and Gerardo for being awarded the NRT Fellowship for the 2019-2020 year!
Check out the piece on the Minnesota Daily on our new NIH grant!
March Congratulations to Hubert Lim, the lead researcher on a $9.7 million NIH grant to restore hearing. This grant will fund a collaboration between the University of Minnesota, the University of Utah, The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, Northwell Health, Hannover Medical School, International Neuroscience Institute, the Hannover Clinical Trial Center, Blackrock Microsystems LLC, and MED-EL. Read more about the grant in the links by The College of Science and Engineering, UMN, Medical School and NewsWise.
Congratulations to the SONIC Lab and several other collaborators for publishing in Nature communications! The project focuses on using ultrasound to treat arthritis. The work has been selected for highlighting by the journal. It has also been highlighted by EurekAlert!, NewsWise, the University of Minnesota and the College of Science and Engineering. Find the article here.
February Congratulations to Gerardo, John, and Abby for receiving the NRT Travel Award sponsored by CATSS!
January Congratulations to Gerardo for receving the ARO Travel Award sponsored by the Association in Research for Otolaryngology!
2018
November We welcome a new graduate student to the SONIC Lab, Inderbir Sondh!
September Congratulations to Claire Kaiser for receiving a MnDRIVE Brain Conditions Fellowship for Commercialization in Neuromodulation. She will be collaborating with the Ultran Group to develop a wearable targeted ultrasound device to treat rheumatoid arthritis! Read more about the project here.
March New article published in The Scientist highlighting our recent discoveries published in Neuron!
Congratulations to Hongsun et al. and our Caltech colleagues for having their work published in Neuron! Read our lab’s paper and our colleague’s paper to learn about the auditory effect caused by ultrasound stimulation.
January Congratulations SONIC Lab for the new DARPA ElectRx grant to pursue a clinical trial evaluating ultrasound neuromodulation of the spleen to treat rheumatoid arthritis in collaboration with Dr. Erik Peterson's team in the Division of Rheumatic and Autoimmune Diseases in the Medical School.
Congratulations SONIC Lab for recently being awarded a DARPA Phase II grant to pursue ultrasound neuromodulation of the immune system for pain treatment with Medtronic (Dr. Sara Offutt's team) and Dr. Bryce Binstadt's lab (Pediatric Rheumatology)
2017
December In collaboration with members of Medtronic, the SONIC lab has submitted an exciting new paper highlighting the effects of ultrasound on the auditory system. Publications
We welcome two new graduate student members to the SONIC lab, Abby Heiller and Claire Kaiser!
We welcome a new undergraduate student member to the SONIC lab, James Kerber, who will work with John on ultrasound hearing technologies.
November We welcome a new high school student member to the SONIC lab, Aditya Satish, who will work with Yezih on testing our mSync treatment for tinnitus patients.
September Dr. Lim serves as new Chief Scientific Officer at Neuromod Devices in Dublin, Ireland!
Welcome to the lab Kate Fernandez, who is in the President's Distinguished Mentor Faculty Program at the University of Minnesota. She will be working with Gerardo performing invasive recordings of the auditory system.
August Welcome to the lab Caitlin Brehmer to work with Yezih and Martha!
Congratulations to John Basile and Gerardo Rodriguez for obtaining the NRT Fellowship through the Center for Cognitive Sciences and the Center for Applied and Translational Sensory Science!
National Science Foundation funds our "NRT Graduate Training Program in Sensory Science: Optimizing the Information for Mind and Brain" led by Dr. Victoria Interrante and affiliated with CCS and CATSS.
The SONIC Lab is excited to welcome its newest member, John Basile! John has a BS in Biomedical Engineering from Lousiana Tech and he will be working with ultrasound technologies applied to hearing disorders.
June Congratulations to Gerardo Rodriguez for obtaining the T32 Fellowship through the Neuroimaging Training Program!
May Congratulations to Cory Gloeckner for successfully defending his PhD thesis titled "Inducing Neural Plasticity and Modulation Using Multisensory Stimulation: Techniques for Sensory Disorder Treatment"! He will remain working in the SONIC Lab as a postdocfor the upcoming year.
Welcome to the lab Elizabeth Batman. Excited to have you work on our human study with Yezih Mesfin and Martha Westman on the enhanced hearing aid to treat tinnitus.
April Great posters at the Minnesota Neuromodulation Symposium by lab members Mark Hamilton and Hongsun Guo. Cory Gloeckner also was chosen to present a selected highlight talk. The title of his talk was: "The effects of stress on plasticity and neuromodulation outcomes".
Congratulations Hubert for being awarded the Institute for Engineering in Medicine Outstanding Service Award presented to him at the 2017 Minnesota Neuromodulation Symposium.
March New book chapter on auditory implants in the 2nd Edition of Neuroprosthetics: Theory and Practice was published together with Drs. Meredith Adams, Peggy Nelson and Andrew Oxhenam. Publications
January Great video featuring Dr. Lim, Yezih and Marti highlighting the value of the MnDRIVE and what the SONIC lab is doing to treat tinnitus. Check it out!
Congratulations to Pooja Mehta for obtaining a Data Scientist position at Preventice Solutions in Houston! She will be greatly missed.
2016
November Today we welcome the newest member of SONIC lab, Gerardo Rodriguez! He will be joining us from the University of Utah and working on a novel hearing aid device.
October Excellent presentations by SONIC lab members and collaborators at the Biomedical Engineering Society Annual Meeting, including talks titled "Can Ultrasound Activate Nerves in vivo?" , "Controlling Modulation and Plasticity in Sensory Cortices Through Neuromodulation", and "Stimulation of Deep Layers But Not Surface of Auditory Cortex Induces Strong Suppression of Activity: Implications for Tinnitus Treatment".
September Congratulations to Dr. Hubert Lim for receiving the 2016 IEM Faculty Career Development Award that was presented to him at the Institute for Engineering in Medicine (IEM) at the University of Minnesota.
The SONIC Lab is awarded a grant from NIH through the newly established REACH Program to push basic science research towards human application and commercialization. This project will pursue a human study to test an enhanced hearing aid concept for tinnitus treatment.
August Recent article highlighting research in the SONIC Lab to develop a new neuromodulation treatment for tinnitus. This research will be led by researchers Yezih Mesfin and Jennifer Wittman from Dr. Lim’s lab. http://www.continuum.umn.edu/2016/08/information-accelerates-innovation/#.V8b9EKJWJkl
June Lab members Hongsun Guo and Mark Hamilton present posters at the Neural Interfaces Conference in Baltimore. These posters include "Investigating Ultrasound Suppression and Activation Effects on Sciatic Nerve in vivo" and "Ultrasound Neuromodulation: Is it Direct Neural Activation or Vibratory Cochlear Activiation of the Brain?".
April Great presentation by Cory Gloeckner titled "Controlling Plasticity in Sensory Cortical Regions using Multisensory Neuromodulation" at the Minnesota Neuromodulation Symposium.
2015
December Watch this great interview of Dr. Lim by WCCO in which some potential benefits of sound therapy are described by a harmonic sound therapist. The SONIC lab is investigating how these types of effects can be controlled to relieve symptoms of various diseases and improve healthcare. http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2015/12/07/ancient-treatment-sound-therapy-rediscovered-in-minnesota/
April Great job Sarah on your talk presenting our brain stimulation research to Minnesota House of Representative Cindy Pugh!
March The SONIC Lab has received a new MnDRIVE grant to develop and optimize ultrasound stimulation to modulate the brain for treating various neurological disorders, including tinnitus and pain. The SONIC Lab is also partnering with Medtronic and has obtained a multi-million dollar grant from the DARPA ElecRx Program under the oversight of Program Manager Dr. Doug Weber.
2014
October The SONIC Lab is part of a transdisciplinary team seeking to develop a new noninvasive neuromodulation approach for treating tinnitus and other brain conditions that is highlighted on Inquiry.
August Dr. Lim and the SONIC Lab are leading a new clinical study funded by the NIH to evaluate the safety and efficacy of a new deep brain stimulation array for hearing restoration that is highlighted on Inquiry.
July Craig Markovitz and Sarah Offutt gave an outstanding talk during Senator Jeremy Miller's visit.