Stimulating Brains Andreas Horn

In our ongoing exploration of the DBS ecosystem through the lens of key industry leaders, below is our conversaion with Amaza Reitmeier who is the Vice President and General Manager of Brain Modulation at Medtronic. We learn differences between life in academia and industry, with a key potential of industry work to get the ability to make change at scale.

In this episode, we discuss what the future of brain modulation may offer, with some aspirational commentary on several potential opportunities for DBS and related therapies. Some of the opportunities we discuss are currently under development by Medtronic or others, while other opportunities may still be in a nascent state without a concrete roadmap for incorporation into a particular product or therapy.

In this very special episode, we are thrilled to welcome back Ben Stecher, marking his remarkable third appearance on StimBrains (you can find him previously featured on episodes #12 and #14). Today’s discussion takes a profound turn as we delve into the unique collaboration between Ben and his neurologist Dr. Alfanso Fasano, who is a Professor in the Department of Medicine (Division of Neurology) at the University of Toronto.

Together, they’ve co-authored ‘Reprogramming The Brain‘, a book that offers a new vision for the future of brain science and neuromodulation. We are very excited to delve into this voyage as seen through the eyes of both a patient navigating the complexities of Parkinson’s disease and his doctor.

When I interviewed Marwan Hariz for episode #4, he wrote in an email: "When you finish the series and all interviews, please let me know because then I should interview you as the Grand Finale of this series…". Throughout the recordings, I heard similar remarks from other guests but also, increasingly, from listeners of the show. After Nico Dosenbach suggested the same in #39, Mike Fox called me and offered to interview me for a round episode of the podcast. With this episode, Stimulating Brains turns #50, and we are indeed flipping the mike so I finally get to experience what I put my guests through on the podcast. Who could have been a better host than Mike for this conversation – as a mentor of tremendous importance, he has been around for (and facilitated) most of the key turning points in my career. Mike and I talk about a lot of things that even covers my youth (thanks to a guest question by Mike Okun), my passion for music, key stages of my career and of course connectomic deep brain stimulation and a thing my lab has begun calling 'the dysfunctome'. We also reflect on the purpose of the podcast and I get to talk at length about how rewarding an experience it has been for me. We then speculate about its future and the future of the field of neuromodulation. Writing this, I want to take the opportunity to thank you all for the continuous support of Stimulating Brains – and of course for tuning into this episode, as well!

Dora Hermes and Kai Miller are associate professors at Mayo Clinic, where they have become a powerhouse on neuroscience, due to their strong collaboration and work in neural signal processing and analysis. Dora has a mathematics background, while Kai studied physics, including a PhD in physics, before becoming a functional neurosurgeon. Last year, both of them last authored a paper each at Nature Neuroscience, each with remarkable and groundbreaking findings about pretty different topics. The first paper dove into the organization of the primary motor cortex using invasive electrophysiological recordings in humans. The second measured conduction delays along fiber tracts in the developing brain.We hope you enjoy this conversation as much as we did!

In our ongoing exploration of the DBS ecosystem throughout the podcast, we've engaged with leading voices in academia, clinical practice, and the patient community, each offering invaluable perspectives on the transformative impact of DBS. Yet, the journey from laboratory to bedside is a collaborative endeavor that requires another critical player: the industry. The symbiosis between innovative scientific research and robust industry support is crucial for the successful transition of groundbreaking therapies from concept to clinical application.

Today's feature is with Dr. Binith Cheeran, M.D., Ph.D., who is the Head of Brain Therapies at Abbott. Before joining Abbott, he spent more than 10 years treating patients as a clinical neurologist in Oxford and more than 15 years in academic research, work for which he was honored by the International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society.

Marwan Hariz and Joachim Krauss need no introduction. First, because they are famous, and second, because they have been on the show, before. In fact, Marwan Hariz is the first to have been on the podcast three times, first, as an early adopter and trustee in episode 3, second, together with Joachim Krauss and Christian Moll in episode 33, and now again with Joachim in the present episode. I met Joachim in Grenoble at a meeting celebrating the 30th year anniversary of STN-DBS. He mentioned that the last episode had been fun, and that it could be great to do an episode on the history of pallidotomies. Needless to say, I would always spend as much time as I can get to speaking with these legends in the field, so of course we went ahead with the idea. I think there are few people that know as much about the history of stereotactic surgery as Joachim and Marwan. In fact, recently, they have been designated as the Historians of the ESSFN and also of the WSSFN (the latter together with Rees Cosgrove).

In this conversation, I learned that pallidotomies came in two waves throughout history, and we may be witnessing the beginning of the third wave now with the growing popularity of focused ultrasound surgery. So sit back and enjoy while Marwan and Joachim take us on a ride through the centuries to shed light on the convoluted historical path of the surgical procedure we call pallidotomy.