Wireless Power Transfer Strategies for Medical Implants

In the recent past, we have experienced astonishing progress in mapping human body functionalities and interconnections, encouraging a holistic view of physiological processes and medical analysis. Similar advances are occurring in modeling and theoretically investigating the interaction between electromagnetic (EM) fields and living systems, opening more and more opportunities to turn bio-EM interactions into a concrete, viable approach to the treatment of a variety of diseases. We are now able to understand the physiological implications of a certain EM stimulation at very deep levels-to cell membranes and beyond-and to quantify with high accuracy EM power density, even for very microscopic scales of analysis. And we can infer from this information the possible consequences of EM stimulation in terms of macroscopic effects on the whole biological system. © 2000-2012 IEEE.