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Gene Yevgeny Fridman, Ph.D., M.S.

Associate Professor of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery

Expertise

Cochlear Implantation, Spinal Cord Stimulation Therapy, Vestibular Disorders ...read more

Research Interests

Neural prostheses; Vestibular and Cochlear implants; Medical Instrumentation ...read more

Background

Dr. Gene Fridman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery and also has appointments with the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research is in the areas of bioinstrumentation and neural engineering.
In bioinstrumentation he is directing research toward developing a “tricorder”-like device, called the MouthLab that obtains many medical measurements in under a minute. The device is currently able to capture all vital signs, electrocardiogram, and pulse oximetry. The work is currently progressing toward obtaining non-invasive blood sugar level and biomarkers from saliva and breath.

In neural engineering he is directing the effort toward a safe direct current neural stimulator (SDCS). This device will enable neural prostheses to not only excite neurons but also to inhibit and modulate their sensitivity. Currently, commercially available neural prostheses are limited in their therapeutic applications because they can excite neurons but not efficiently inhibit them.

Dr. Fridman is a Biomedical and Electrical engineer. After receiving his Masters in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University in 1995, he worked in the industry for five years as a software and systems engineer before deciding to engage in an academic career. He received his PhD in Biomedical Engineering specializing in neural recording and stimulation and micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) from UCLA in 2006. Over the past 12 years he has held an on-going consulting relationship with several biomedical engineering companies in research and design of neural stimulation and recording devices. He contributed to research and development of retinal, cortical, cochlear, and vestibular implants.

Titles

Associate Professor of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery
Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering

Departments / Divisions

Education

Degrees

Ph.D.; David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA (California) (2006)
M.S.; Purdue University (Indiana) (1994)
B.S.; University of Kansas (Kansas) (1992)

Additional Training

Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, 2009, Neuroengineering applied to the Vestibular System

Research & Publications

Lab

Lab Website: Fridman Lab

Selected Publications

Fridman GY, Della Santina CC, “Safe Direct Current Stimulator 2: Concept and Design”, IEEE EMBC 2013 Conference Paper

Valentin NS, Hageman K, Dai C, Della Santina CC, Fridman GY, “Development of a Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Prototype by Modification of a Commercially Available Cochlear Implant, IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2013 May 1. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 23649285

Fridman GY, Della Santina CC, “Safe Direct Current Stimulation to Expand Capabilities of Neural Prostheses”, IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2013 May 1. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 23649285

Davidovics NS, Rahman MA, Dai C, Ahn JH, Fridman GY, Della Santina CC, “Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Employing Modulation of Pulse Rate and Current with Alignment Precompensation Elicits Improved VOR Performance in Monkeys”, J Assoc Res Otolaryngol. 2013 Apr;14(2):233-48. doi: 10.1007/s10162-013-0370-7. Epub 2013 Jan 26. PubMed PMID: 23355001; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3660911

Fridman GY, Della Santina CC., “Progress toward development of a multichannel vestibular prosthesis for treatment of bilateral vestibular deficiency.”, Anat Rec (Hoboken). 2012 Nov;295(11):2010-29. doi: 10.1002/ar.22581. Epub 2012 Oct 8

Davidovics NS, Fridman GY, Della Santina CC., “Co-modulation of stimulus rate and current from elevated baselines expands head motion encoding range of the vestibular prosthesis.”, Exp Brain Res. 2012 May;218(3):389-400. doi: 10.1007/s00221-012-3025-8. Epub 2012 Feb 19.

Sun D.Q., Rahman MA, Fridman GY, Chiang B, Dai C, Della Santina CC, “Chronic Stimulation of the Semicircular Canals Using a Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis: Effects on Locomotion and Angular Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex in Chinchillas”, Conf. Proc. IEEE 33rd Annual EMBC Conference, Boston, MA 2011

Rahman MA, Dai C, Fridman GY, Davidovics NS, Chiang B, Ahn JH, Hayden R, Melvin TN, Sun DQ, and Della Santina CC, “Restoring the 3D Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex via Electrical Stimulation: The Johns Hopkins Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Project” Conf. Proc. IEEE 33rd Annual EMBC Conference, Boston, MA 2011

Dai, C, Fridman GY, Chiang B, Davidovics NS, Melvin TA, Cullen KE, Della Santina CC, “Cross-axis adaptation improves 3D vestiblulo-ocular reflex alignment during chronic stimulation via a head-mounted multichannel vestibular prosthesis”, Exp Brain Res. 2011 May;210(3-4):595-606. Epub 2011 Mar 4.

Chiang B, Fridman G, Dai C, Della Santina C, “Design and performance of a multichannel vestibular prosthesis that restores semicircular canal sensation in macaques.”, IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2011 Oct;19(5):588-98. Epub 2011 Aug 18.

Dai C, Fridman GY, Della Santina CC. “Effects of Vestibular Prosthesis Electrode Implantation and Stimulation on Hearing in Rhesus Monkey”, Hear Res. 2011 Jul;277(1-2):204-10. Epub 2010 Dec 31.

Della Santina CC, Migliaccio AA, Hayden R, Melvin TA, Fridman GY, Chiang B, Davidovics NS, Dai C, Carey JP, Minor LB, Anderson ICW, Park H, Lyford-Pike S, Tang S, “Current and Future Management of Bilateral Loss of Vestibular Sensation – An update on the Johns Hopkins Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Project,”Cochlear Implants International 2010 Sept 11(s2): 2-11.

Davidovics NS, Fridman GY, Chiang B, Della Santina CC, “Effects of biphasic current pulse frequency, amplitude, duration and interphase gap on eye movement responses to prosthetic electrical stimulation of the vestibular nerve”, IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2011 Feb;19(1):84-94. Epub 2010 Sep 2.

Fridman GY., Davidovics NS, Dai CC, Migliaccio AA, Della Santina CC “Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex Responses to a Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Incorporating a 3D Coordinate Transformation for Correction of Misalignment”, J Assoc Res Otolaryngol. 2010 Sep;11(3):367-81. Epub 2010 Feb 23.

Fridman GY, Blair HT, Blaisdell AP, Judy JW. “Perceived intensity of somatosensory cortical electrical stimulation”, Exp Brain Res. 2010 Jun; 203(3):499-515.

Jacobs AL, Fridman GY, Douglas RM, Alam NJ, Latham PE, Prusky GT, Nirenberg S, (2009) “Ruling Out and Ruling in Neural Codes”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 106 (14): 5936-5941 April 7, 2009

Litvak LM, Spahr AJ, Saoji AA, Fridman GY, (2007) “Relationship Between Perception of Spectral Ripple and Speech Recognition in Cochlear Implant and Vocoder Listeners”, Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 122 (2): 982-991 AUG 2007

Fridman GY, Blair HT, Blaisdell AP, Judy JW, “Somatosensory Feedback to Improve Brain-Machine Interfaces: Stimulation Studies in Rat Whisker Barrel Somatosensory Cortex”, 2007 3rd International IEEE/EMBS Conference on Neural Engineering, Vols 1 and 2 Pages: 379-385

Google Scholar

Activities & Honors

Honors

Neurobiology Retreat Best Paper Award, UCLA, 2003
Al Mann Engineer of the Year Award Advanced , Bionics Corp, 1998

Memberships

Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO)
Institute for Electrical And Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Professional Activities

Reviewer, IEEE
Reviewer, TBIOCAS
Reviewer, JARO

Videos & Media

Lectures and Presentations

Safe Direct Current Neural Implant
Design of Medical Devices Conference, University of Minnesota (08/06/2014)
Safe Direct Current Stimulation System to Improve Vestibular Prosthesis Performance
BMES, Osaka, Japan (08/06/2014)
Safe Direct Current Stimulation to Expand Capabilities of Neural Prostheses
ICNPD-2012, Freiburg, Germany (08/06/2014)
Neural Engineering Workshop
Cleveland, OH (08/06/2014)
Solutions to Problem of Electrode Channel Interaction in a Vestibular Prosthesis
BMES, Austin, TX (08/06/2014)
Understanding Evolving Technology for Cochlear and Vestibular Implants
Medical Devices Regulation and Compliance Meeting, Boston, MA (08/06/2014)
Design and Development for Cochlear and Vestibular Implants
Presentation, 11th Software Design for Medical Devices Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA (08/06/2014)
Give Haptics A Hand
41st Annual Winter Conference on Brain Research, Snow Bird, UT (08/06/2014)
A Biophysical Model for the Perceived Intensity of Cortical Electrical Stimulation
BMES, Los Angeles, CA (08/06/2014)
Addition of Chronic Direct Current Stimulation Improves Vestibular Prosthesis Dynamic Range
Assoc. Research in Otolaryngology Mid Winter Meeting, San Diego, CA (08/06/2014)
Linearity of the 3-D Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex Response to Electrical Stimulation
BMES, St. Louis, MO (08/06/2014)
Frequency discrimination of artificial brain stimulation delivered to whisker barrel cortex in rats
Society for Neuroscience, Atlanta, GA (08/06/2014)
Information Theory Analysis of Retinal Response to Flash Stimuli
Neuroscience/Neuroengineering Retreat, Los Angeles, CA (08/06/2014)

Recent News Articles and Media Coverage

These ER Docs Invented a Real Star Trek Tricorder, NBC News (5/10/2017)

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