Keck School of Medicine of USC Dean Rohit Varma, MD, MPH, welcomed Gianluca Lazzi, PhD, MBA, recently as the guest speaker for the Dean’s Distinguished Lecturer Series. Lazzi, chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Utah, gave a lecture titled, “Bioelectromagnetics for Neuroimplants: From Wireless Power and Data Transfer to Direct Neurostimulation,” Dec. 12 on the Health Sciences Campus.

The lecture covered the history of research in bioelectromagnetics and neuroimplants, discussing the trajectory of information gathering over the past 30 years.

“We need to think about where we were and where we are now, in order to understand where we might be,” Lazzi said.

Creating predictive simulations, for example, was a science-fiction-type idea when scientists were looking at very low-resolution renderings decades ago. Now, Lazzi said, every two days, scientists create as much data as was created from the beginning of mankind until 2003.

Lazzi also discussed advancements in liquid electronics, which are used to create wearable devices as well as adaptive neuroimplants.