• 대한의용생체공학회:의공학회지
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• 제26권5호
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• pp.309-317
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• 2005

It is expected that fully-implantable middle-ear hearing devices (FIMEHDs) will soon be available with the advantages of complete concealment, easy surgical implantation, and low power operation to resolve the problems of semi-implantable middle-ear hearing devices (SIMEHDs) such as discomfort of wearing an external device and replacement of battery. Over the last 3 years, a Korean research team at Kyungpook National University has developed an FIMEHD called ACRHS-1 based on a differential floating mass transducer (DFMT). The main research focus was functional improvement, the establishment of easy surgical procedures for implantation, miniaturization, and a low-power operation. Accordingly, this paper reviews the overall system architecture, functions, and experimental results for ACRHS-1 and its related accessories, including a wireless battery charger and remote controller.

• 재활복지공학회논문지
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• 제3권1호
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• pp.21-25
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• 2009

일반적으로 완전 이식형 인공중이는 이식형 마이크로폰과 진동 트랜스듀서를 포함한 모든 구성 요소가 측두골 부근 피부 아래에 이식되는 보청기이다. 마이크로폰과 트랜스듀서의 경우 이식 전과 후의 동작 주파수 특성 등이 달라진다. 이러한 특성변화와 이식 대상자의 청력특성에 알맞은 보청기 동작을 수행하기 위해 적합과정을 수행하게 된다. 일반 공기전도형 보청기나 부분 이식형 보청기의 경우 적합을 위한 전선 연결부가 존재하나 완전이식형의 경우에는 몸속에 모두 이식됨으로 이러한 전선의 연결이 어려우며 이에 따라 기존 보청기의 적합 프로그램을 적용하는 하드웨어를 이용한 적합이 어렵다. 본 논문에서는 완전 이식형 인공중이를 위한 무선 적합 하드웨어에 적용 가능한 적합 소프트웨어를 설계 및 구현하였다. 구현한 적합 소프트웨어는 마이크로폰과 트랜스듀서의 특성과 난청자의 청력도를 반영하여 적절한 청력 보상치를 산출할 수 있다.

• 한국멀티미디어학회논문지
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• 제19권2호
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• pp.189-199
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• 2016

Many implantable hearing aids are being developed as alternatives to conventional hearing aids which has inconveniences for use and social stigma that make hearing-impaired people avoid to wear it. Particularly, the fully-implantable middle ear hearing devices (F-IMEHD) are being actively studied for mixed or sensorineural hearing impaired people. In development of F-IMEHD, the most difficult problem is improving the performance of implantable microphone. Recently, Cho et al. have studied the tympanic membrane installed microphone which has better sensitivity and is easier to operate on patient than the microphone implanted under the skin. But, it may cause howling problem due to the feedback signal via oval window and ossicle chain from the transducer on round window in the middle ear cavity, therefore, a feedback canceller is necessary. In this paper, we designed NLMS (normalized least mean square) adaptive feedback canceller for F-IMEHD with tympanic membrane installed microphone and a transducer implemented at round window, and computer simulation was performed to verify its operation. The designed adaptive feedback canceller has a delay filter, a 64 point FIR fixed filter and a 8-tap adaptive FIR filter. Computer simulation of the feedback path is modeled by using the data obtained through human cadaver experiment.

• 센서학회지
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• 제19권5호
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• pp.361-368
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• 2010

ACROSS device, which is composed of an implantable microphone, a signal processor, and a vibrating transducer, is a fullyimplantable middle ear hearing device(F-IMEHD) for the recovery of patients with hearing loss. And since a microphone is implanted under skin and tissue at the temporal bones, the amplitude of the sound wave is attenuated by absorption and scattering. And the vibrating transducer attached to the ossicular chain caused also the different displacement from characteristic of the stapes. For the gain control of auditory signals, most of implantable hearing devices with the digital audio signal processor still apply to fitting rules of conventional hearing aid without regard to the effect of the implanted microphone and the vibrating transducer. So it should be taken into account the effect of the implantable microphone and the vibrating transducer to use the conventional audio fitting rule. The aim of this study was to measure gain characteristics caused by the implanted microphone and the vibrating transducer attached to the ossicle chains for the gain compensation of ACROSS device. Differential floating mass transducers (DFMT) of ACROSS device were clipped on four cadaver temporal bones. And after placing the DFMT on them, displacements of the ossicle chain with the DFMT operated by 1 $mA_{peak}$ current was measured using laser Doppler vibrometer. And the sensitivity of microphones under the sampled pig skin and the skin of 3 rat back were measured by stimulus of pure tones in frequency from 0.1 to 8.9 kHz. And we confirmed that the microphone implanted under skin showed poorer frequency response in the acoustic high-frequency band than it in the low- to mid- frequency band, and the resonant frequency of the stapes vibration was changed by attaching the DFMT on the incus, the displacement of the DFMT driven with 1 $mA_{rms}$ was higher by the amount of about 20 dB than that of cadaver's stapes driven by the sound presssure of 94 dB SPL in resonance frequency range.

• 대한의용생체공학회:의공학회지
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• 제28권4호
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• pp.539-548
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• 2007

In the paper, a wireless charger with the function of auto-shutdown for fully implantale middle ear hearing devices (F-IMEHD) has been designed. The wireless charger can communicate with an implant module to be turned off automatically shutdown after an internal rechargeable battery has been fully-charged by electromagnetic coupling using two coils. For the communication with an implant module, the wireless charger uses the load shift keying (LSK) method. But, the variation of the mutual inductance due to the different distance between two coils can cause the communication error in receiving the fully-charged signal from an implant module. To solve the problem, the implemented wireless charger has a variable reference generator for LSK communication. The wireless charger generates proper level of the reference voltage for a comparator using an ADC (analog-to-digital converter) and a DAC (digital-to-analog converter). Through the result of experiment, it has been confirmed that the presented wireless charger can detect signals from implantable module. And wireless charger can stop generating electromagnetic flux after an implanted battery has been fully charged in spite of variable coil distance according to different skin thickness.

• 센서학회지
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• 제21권2호
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• pp.144-150
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• 2012

A microphone for fully implantable hearing device was generally implanted under the skin of the temporal bone. So, the implanted microphone's characteristics can be affected by the accompanying noise due to masticatory movement. In this paper, the implantable microphone with 2-channels structure was designed for reduction of the generated noise signal by masticatory movement. And an experimental model for generation of the noise by masticatory movement was developed with considering the characteristics of human temporal bone and skin. Using the model, the speech signal by a speaker and the artificial noise by a vibrator were supplied simultaneously into the experimental model, the electrical signals were measured at the proposed microphone. The collected signals were processed using a general adaptive filter with least mean square(LMS) algorithm. To confirm performance of the proposed methods, the correlation coefficient and the signal to noise ratio(SNR) before and after the signal processing were calculated. Finally, the results were compared each other.

• 재활복지공학회논문지
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• 제2권1호
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• pp.27-33
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• 2009

일반적으로, 완전 이식형 인공중이의 이식형 마이크로폰은 측두골 부근에 이식되어진다. 이 경우, 마이크로폰의 진동막이 외부 충격이나 생체 노이즈의 영향 받을 수 있으며 이런 문제를 해결하기 위하여 이식용 마이크로폰을 외이도 내에 이식하는 방법을 고려할 수 있다. 그러나 이소골에 이식된 진동 트랜스듀서에 의해서 고막으로부터 외이도 방향으로 음향 반향이 발생할 가능성이 있다. 본 논문에서는 사람의 귀와 유사한 특성을 가지는 귀 모델을 제작하여 프로브 마이크로폰의 위치를 변경해가며 외이도의 음향 반향을 측정하였고 실험결과를 통하여 외이도 내에서의 마이크로폰의 이식 위치를 추정해 보았다. 분석 결과 외이도에 마이크로폰을 이식할 경우 고막에서 멀어질수록 반향 신호가 감소함을 확인할 수는 있었으나, 반향 신호를 완전히 제거할 수 없기 때문에 외이도에 마이크로폰을 이식하기에는 부적합한 것으로 예상된다.