---
title: "Northwestern University researchers print artificial neurons that communicate with living brain cells"
url: https://www.voxelmatters.com/northwestern-university-researchers-print-artificial-neurons-that-communicate-with-living-brain-cells/
date: 2026-06-08
modified: 2026-06-08
lang: en
author: "Joseph Caron-Dawe"
description: "Northwestern University engineers have developed 3D printed artificial neurons capable of generating electrical signals that activate living brain cells, in a development that could advance both bioelectronic medicine and computing..."
categories:
  - "Medical AM"
  - "Medical Research"
tags:
  - "future"
image: https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Printed-neurons-01-640x400.jpg
word_count: 461
---

# Northwestern University researchers print artificial neurons that communicate with living brain cells

[Northwestern University engineers](https://www.voxelmatters.com/northwestern-university-researchers-3d-print-more-powerful-ybco-superconductors/) have developed [3D printed artificial neurons](https://www.voxelmatters.com/postech-researchers-3d-print-human-brain-model/) capable of generating electrical signals that activate living brain cells, in a development that could advance both bioelectronic medicine and computing architecture.

The devices, built from flexible, low-cost materials, produced signals realistic enough to trigger responses in tissue samples taken from mouse brains

## From silicon chips to soft materials

Contemporary computing relies on billions of uniform transistors etched onto rigid silicon chips, in systems that are fixed once manufactured. The brain, by contrast, uses diverse, specialized neurons arranged in three-dimensional, constantly adapting networks.

![Northwestern University researchers print artificial neurons that communicate with living brain cells](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Printed-neurons-02-340x213.jpg)

“Silicon achieves complexity by having billions of identical devices,” said Mark C. Hersam, Walter P. Murphy Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Northwestern's McCormick School of Engineering, and co-lead of the study.

“Everything is the same, rigid and fixed once it's fabricated. The brain is the opposite. It's heterogeneous, dynamic and three-dimensional. To move in that direction, we need new materials and new ways to build electronics.”

Hersam's team constructed the artificial neurons using [electronic inks derived from nanoscale flakes of molybdenum disulfide](https://www.voxelmatters.com/ids-and-electroninks-enter-printed-microelectronics-partnership/), a semiconductor, and graphene, an electrical conductor. These inks were deposited onto flexible polymer substrates using aerosol jet printing.

Rather than removing the stabilizing polymer from the inks entirely, the researchers left it partially intact, a deliberate choice that proved consequential.

“Instead of fully removing the polymer, we partially decompose it,” Hersam explained. “Then, when we pass current through the device, we drive further decomposition of the polymer. This decomposition occurs in a spatially inhomogeneous manner, leading to formation of a conductive filament, such that all the current is constricted into a narrow region in space.”

That localized pathway allowed each device to produce varied signaling patterns — single spikes, sustained firing, and bursting sequences — rather than the simplified pulses generated by earlier artificial neuron designs.

## Biological validation and computing implications

To confirm the devices could interface with living tissue, Hersam's team worked with Indira M. Raman, Bill and Gayle Cook Professor of Neurobiology at Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, whose team applied the artificial signals to mouse cerebellum slices. The signals matched the timing and shape of natural neuron activity and reliably triggered responses in real neural circuits.

“Other labs have tried to make artificial neurons with organic materials, and they spiked too slowly,” Hersam said. “Or they used metal oxides, which are too fast. We are within a temporal range that was not previously demonstrated for artificial neurons. You can see the living neurons respond to our artificial neuron. So, we've demonstrated signals that are not only the right timescale but also the right spike shape to interact directly with living neurons.”

[The study was published in *Nature Nanotechnology*](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41565-026-02149-6) and co-led by Vinod K. Sangwan, Research Associate Professor at McCormick.