Engineering of neural interfaces with nanomaterials for remote manipulation facilitates the development of platforms for the study and treatment of brain disorders, yet extending their capability to inhibiting the electrical activities of unmodified neurons has been difficult. Here we report the development of an electro-optical neural platform integrated with gold nanorods for simultaneous electrical excitation and readout, and photothermal inhibition of neural activities. A monolayer of gold nanorods was placed at the electrode-neuron interfaces of a microelectrode array for photothermal stimulation of neural activities. This nanoplasmonic interface interacted well with neurons and metal electrodes without affecting the biological and electrical properties. We demonstrated that spontaneous firing of neurons and their signal propagation along the neurites evoked by electrical stimulation were optically inhibited on this neural platform. We believe that our platform could be an alternative to the optogenetic approach and may ultimately be applied to prosthetic devices based on optical neuromodulation.
Keywords: gold nanorods; monolayer; neural interface; neural prosthetics; photothermal stimulation.