Dr. Breanne Christie is a senior staff engineer whose research focuses on somatosensory and visual neuroprostheses. Her dissertation research primarily focused on restoring tactile feedback to lower-limb amputees using electrodes implanted on the sciatic nerve. Since then, she has transitioned to restoring sensory function to two additional populations: individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) and individuals with retinitis pigmentosa (RP).

For her work with SCI, Dr. Christie uses an intracortical microstimulation technique to elicit tactile sensations in the fingertips. For her work with RP, she is working to improve the rudimentary visual feedback delivered via epiretinal prostheses by developing novel stimulation paradigms and multisensory approaches.

Dr. Christie also teaches an “Introduction to Neural Prostheses” course that she designed for the Johns Hopkins Engineering for Professionals Applied Biomedical Engineering program.

Experience

• Senior Staff Engineer (2022 - present)

  Applied Physics Laboratory

  Johns Hopkins University

• Postdoctoral Researcher (2020 - 2022)

  Applied Physics Laboratory

  Johns Hopkins University

Education

• PhD, Biomedical/Medical Engineering (2015 - 2019)

  Case Western Reserve University

• MS, Biomedical/Medical Engineering (2014 - 2015)

  Arizona State University

• BS, Biomedical/Medical Engineering (2010 - 2014)

  University of Michigan, Ann Arbor