The development of multi-channel action-potential generator for testing neurophysiologic data acquisition/analysis system

In our research, the multi-channel action-potentials (APs) generator based on high-speed USB interface is designed to test neurophysiologic data acquisition/analysis system. This multi-channel APs generator is composed of a personal computer and an external hardware unit. This generator is not only capable of generating a simulated APs waveform, and also generating random occurred APs with a specified rate ranging form 1 to 200 events per second. The waveform of each channel can be easily changed by using 2 parameters. Additionally, the programmable system on a Chip (PSoC/sup /spl trade//) component is adopted to simplify circuit units. Specifically, 16 channels, the maximum of the functions in this generator, can be spontaneously reached. Moreover, an application software is developed to generate APs waveform and a digital oscilloscope is used to verify the waveform as well. The voltage waveform produced by APs generator can be used to test neurophysiologic data acquisition systems for recording a spike trains and testing multispike-train analysis.