The field of neuro-engineering research, which exists at the convergence of engineering with the fields of neuroscience, neurology, and neurosurgery, has led to a number of transformative neurotechnological breakthroughs. Leading examples include the development and successful commercialization of neuroengineered systems for the sensory nervous system (e.g., the cochlear implant, which has enabled over 320,000 profoundly deaf people to hear) and the motor nervous system (e.g., deep-brain-stimulation systems (DBS), which have greatly reduced or eliminated the debilitating symptoms of neurodegenerative movement disorders in over 120,000 people).

Neuro-engineering research in NIMET ranges from the development of novel neural interfaces to record and stimulate neural activity, algorithms to decode, process, and encode neural information, and

involves people from at least 4 different colleges and over 16 different departments.

as well as the

Inspired by these engineering advances to interface with the sensory and motor portions of the nervous system, a team from The University of Florida (UF), Georgia Institute of Technology (GT), and Florida International University (FIU), proposes to create the Center for Autonomic Neural Engineering (CANE) to rationally design, fabricate, and validate complete cutting-edge neural-engineered systems specifically to interface with the autonomic nervous system (ANS). Since the ANS is responsible for controlling many internal organs and their life-critical body functions (e.g., breathing, metabolism, digestion, heart function, etc.), it is not surprising that ANS malfunction due to disease or injury is directly responsible for 6 of the top 10 leading causes of death in the US (i.e., chronic lower respiratory diseases, diabetes, heart diseases, renal diseases, Alzheimer’s, and stroke killed a total of 1,096,745 in 2013 [3]).

within NIMET involves people from 4 different colleges and over 16 different departments as well as the

spans a wide range of topics and scientific and clinical applications. It is enga