NMI Natural and Medical Sciences Institute:
Applied R&D at the interface between life and material sciences
The NMI is a non-profit organization established in 1985. The principle
goal is to perform applied research for industrial clients by transferring
results from basic sciences into new technology and product development.
The core-competences of the NMI are in the areas of:
Pharma and biotechnology
Biomedical technology
Surface and interface technology
For drug discovery and neurotechnology applications the NMI develops and provides versatile microelectrode arrays, in vitro systems and MEA applications for functional analysis at single cell and network level
Test systems for drug discovery:
There are two principle lines to follow in order to cope with the today´s demands for innovative electrophysiological methods for secondary functional screening of drug effects.
to increase the throughput of compounds and targets to be tested by developing
effective and automated measuring systems and protocols, and
to develop in vitro models that closely reflect in vivo systems in order to study the mechanisms by which drugs effect complex biological systems and not only their individual components.
We are offering:
· State of the art electrophysiological techniques (extra-and
intracellular recordings, patch clamp recordings in single cells and tissue
slices) for screening of drug effects on ion channels and receptors
· Micro Electrode Array (MEA)- Technology for pharmacological and
functional studies on dissociated neurones, acute sclices and organotypic
slice cultures. With this technique, short- and long-term monitoring of
spatio-temporal spread of activity in nervous and heart muscle tissue
in presence of defined drug concentrations can be performed. Moreover,
co-culture models are available for basic and pharmaceutical research
in the field of neuronal degeneration and repair as well as synaptic plasticity
and stability.
· Roboocyte applications for the fast and effective screening of
drug effects on ion channels and receptors expressed in oocytes.
Neurotechnology:
Active medical implants play an important role in neuroprosthetics. Current
research efforts are aimed at the development of implantable prostheses
which allow electrical stimulation of central and peripheral nerve cell
populations in order to overcome lesions causing sensory and motoric deficits.
The NMI is developing procedures and technical components for electrically
active as well as biohybrid implants. The work is aimed at the establishment
of an implantable visual prosthesis. The NMI develops electrodes with
high charge injection capacity, biocompatible encapsulation layers, systems
for functional electric multisite stimulation (FEMS) of neuronal tissue
and biohybrid systems which combine technical structures with implanted
nerve cells.
