CNN airs special program on Cohen, Etienne-Cummings research

• Avis Cohen
• Etienne-Cummings
• spinal cord
• lamprey

A film crew from the CNN International television series Earth's Frontiers spent most of a day visiting Professor Avis Cohen (Biology/ISR) and ISR-affiliated Profesor Ralph Etienne-Cummings (Johns Hopkins University) and their labs for a June 24, 2010 show.

The researchers were interviewed about their longstanding collaboration on a biologically inspired computer chip that could help restore leg motion to paraplegics. The chip is modeled on the lamprey spinal cord and contains a silicon analog of spinal circuits. The chip currently is able to control a walking robot. Feedback from the joint angles and foot-falls of the robot are incorporated to train networks of neurons in the spinal cord called central pattern generators to recognize the correct frequency and phase relationship between limbs that is necessary for smooth and natural motions.

View the show on CNN International.

Published June 25, 2010