Rice and Houston Methodist researchers to study brain-implant interface with Dunn Foundation award

(Press-News.org) HOUSTON – (Nov. 6, 2025) – A team of researchers from Rice University and the Houston Methodist Research Institute has received a John S. Dunn Foundation Collaborative Research Award through the Gulf Coast Consortia to study how the brain responds over time to neural implants. 

The project brings together expertise in materials science, neuroscience and clinical medicine and is led by Rice researchers Yimo Han, assistant professor of materials science and nanoengineering, and Chong Xie, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, together with Dr. Damiano Barone, assistant professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at the Houston Methodist Research Institute.

The collaboration aims to improve understanding of how implanted neural devices integrate with brain tissue, work that could guide the design of more stable and longer-lasting brain-computer interfaces and neuroprosthetics. The researchers will look specifically at nanoelectronic threads, or NETs — ultraflexible electrodes that can record brain activity and provide neurostimulation with minimal tissue damage. 

Han’s group will use a specialized visualization technique to examine the interface between the implants and surrounding brain tissue, while Barone will map how individual cells near the implant respond at the genetic level. The project aims to establish a quantitative framework for understanding the neuroinflammation response to implanted devices.

“We want to see at nanometer resolution how cells organize around these devices,” Han said. “The goal is to identify the conditions that lead to stable, long-term integration.”

The results could inform the development of next-generation neural implants that are more compatible with brain tissue, helping improve the reliability of devices used to treat neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy and stroke.

“Understanding the immune and fibrotic responses to these implants is critical, and our combined expertise allows for a systematic and comprehensive analysis that will hopefully enable better ways to predict and control these biological processes,” Barone said.

Xie, who leads the lab that developed the NETs, said the probes were designed with the goal of overcoming challenges associated with conventional brain implants, which can trigger inflammation and scarring that interfere with long-term performance. 

“Our ultraflexible probes have shown stable performance in animal models,” Xie said. “Now we are trying to understand the biological mechanisms that make that possible.”

The John S. Dunn Foundation Collaborative Research Award Program, administered by the Gulf Coast Consortia, supports new interdisciplinary and interinstitutional research in the quantitative biomedical sciences. The program funds early stage collaborations among investigators from different GCC member institutions, including Rice, Houston Methodist Research Institute, Baylor College of Medicine, University of Houston and others.

Projects are selected based on scientific quality, novelty, interdisciplinary integration and potential long-term impact on human health.

“The Dunn Foundation and the Gulf Coast Consortia provide a unique framework for high-impact collaboration,” the research team said. “We are grateful for the opportunity to pursue this work and generate essential preliminary data in this emerging field.”


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About Rice:

Located on a 300-acre forested campus in Houston, Texas, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation’s top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of architecture, business, continuing studies, engineering and computing, humanities, music, natural sciences and social sciences and is home to the Baker Institute for Public Policy. Internationally, the university maintains the Rice Global Paris Center, a hub for innovative collaboration, research and inspired teaching located in the heart of Paris. With 4,776 undergraduates and 4,104 graduate students, Rice’s undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is just under 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice is ranked No. 1 for lots of race/class interaction and No. 7 for best-run colleges by the Princeton Review. Rice is also rated as a best value among private universities by the Wall Street Journal and is included on Forbes’ exclusive list of “New Ivies.” 

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