1. Manuals
  2. Brands
  3. NeuroNexus Manuals
  4. TV Tuner
  5. SmartBox
  6. Instruction manual

NeuroNexus SmartBox Instruction Manual

Hide thumbs
Table of Contents

Advertisement

Quick Links

SmartBox
™
Instruction Manual
Version 1.5
Updated June 12, 2014
NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014
| 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA
Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |
support@neuronexus.com

Advertisement

Table of Contents
loading
Need help?

Need help?

Do you have a question about the SmartBox and is the answer not in the manual?

Questions and answers

Summary of Contents for NeuroNexus SmartBox

  • Page 1 SmartBox ™ Instruction Manual Version 1.5 Updated June 12, 2014 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 2 OR call +1.734.913.8858. NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. is a global leader for innovative neural interface products and technologies to meet both current and upcoming needs in neuroscience research, neuro- surgery, and neurostimulation. Intan Technologies The SmartBox is developed in collaboration with Intan Technologies.

  • Page 3: Table Of Contents

    Side Panels Upsampling Waveform Data p.26 Compatible Accessories WARRANTY INFOR M ATION p.27 CONNE CT IO N S Connecting the SmartBox to a SmartProbe ™ ™ A PPENDIX A: ADD ING A LED p.28 Connecting the SmartBox to a SmartLink headstage ™...

  • Page 4: Hardware

    Stereo Line Out - channels selectable in software Indicator lights for auditory monitoring of neural signals 4 HDMI ports for neural data acquisition Power button NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 5: Back Panel

    ADC_CS: Digital clock signal to sync external devices (user-selectable sampling rate) Voltage Pins: +3.3 V, -3.3 V, +3.5 V, +5V (See p.10 for pin out) NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 6 -3.3 V - +3.3 V; Reconstruct digital neural signals back to analog signals, e.g. light pulses or lever press for oscilloscope monitoring, or acquire with LabVIEW. Channels selectable in software. NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 7: Compatible Accessories

    All SmartLink headstages use on-board electronics to digitize neural signals at the implant site. This improves signal fidelity and reduces noise from cable and animal movement. SmartLink headstages connect to the SmartBox with a custom HDMI cable. (NOTE: Regular HDMI cables will not work with the SmartBox family.) ™...

  • Page 8: Connections

    CONNECTIONS How to connect the SmartBox ™ W ITH SMARTPROB ES ™ USB port Connect to earth ground 3.5 mm jack for USB port 5 VDC, 2 A in aural monitoring (Standard-B) SmartBox ™ HDMI Connector Micro HDMI Connector SmartProbe ™...
  • Page 9 CONNECTIONS How to connect the SmartBox ™ W ITH SMARTL INK HEA DS TA GE S ™ USB port Connect to earth ground USB port 3.5 mm jack for 5 VDC, 2 A in (Standard-B) aural monitoring SmartBox ™ HDMI Connector...

  • Page 10: Analog And Digital Inputs And Outputs

    DB-50 breakout board such as the BRKDD50M TTLOUT5 offered by Winford Engineering (http://www.winfordeng.com/products/ TTLOUT6 brkdd50.php). p.10 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 11: Software

    (the FPGA configuration file), okFrontPanel.dll (the DLL for the Opal Kelly module), QtCore4.dll, and QtGui4.dll (DLLs for the Qt libraries). These four supporting files must reside in the directory with the executable file. To run the GUI, double-click on SmartBox.exe. (At the moment, the applica- tion cannot be placed in the Start menu.

  • Page 12: Waveform Displays

    ™ GUI software written in C++ using the multi-platform Qt libraries. A Windows executable is available on the NeuroNexus website. See the “Installing USB Drivers and GUI Software” section on the previous page of this document for detailed installation instructions.
  • Page 13 A yellow trace indicates derated (~3.0V) operation, and a red trace indicates over- or under-voltage conditions. p.13 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

  • Page 14: Data Viewing And Acquisition

    20, 25, or 30 kS/s. Higher sampling rates will produce larger saved data files. Saved data files may be imported into MATLAB using an m-file available at neuronexus.com. Also provided is an m-file that upsamples amplifier data by a factor of two (using cubic spline fitting), so higher effective sampling rates may be approximated.
  • Page 15 USB port. The “FIFO lag” indicator near the “Stop” button shows the estimated amount of data waiting in the FIFO USB buffer on the FPGA module. If this number begins growing beyond a few milliseconds it turns red, indicating that the computer is having trouble keeping up with the data streaming from the SmartBox ™...

  • Page 16: Electrode Impedance Measurement

    The most recent impedance measurement is also saved in the .rhd header of recorded data files, and this information can be extracted in MATLAB after data acquisition is complete. Analog Waveform Reconstruction and Audio Output The “DAC/Audio” tab contains controls for routing selected amplifier channels directly to any of the eight 16-bit DACs on the SmartBox ™ in order to reconstruct analog waveforms that may be observed on oscilloscopes or acquired using traditional data acquisition systems (e.g., National Instruments...
  • Page 17 It is important to note that the audio noise slicing function only affects the signals on DACs 1 and 2. p.17 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

  • Page 18: Configure Tab

    . This pin is brought out to a solder point labeled DO on some amplifier boards, and can drive saved data files. p.18 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

  • Page 19: Spike Scope

    The Spike Scope may be used to identify action potential shapes in neural recording applications. p.19 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

  • Page 20: Triggered Recording Mode

    The “Trigger” button enables triggered recordings. Users may select any of the analog or digi- FIG. 28: The Spike Scope allows users to superimpose multiple thresh- tal inputs on the SmartBox to serve as the trigger line (see FIG. 29). After trigger parameters ™...

  • Page 21: Menu Functions

    FIG. 30: Three different data file formats may be chosen for waveforms saved to disk.set to zero, and signals extending beyond this range are brought in towards zero. p.21 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 22: Importing Recorded Data Into Neuroexplorer

    Importing Recorded Data into NeuroExplorer The recorded .rhd files from the SmartBox can be easily converted to .nex files using a file converter developed by NeuroNexus Technologies. These .nex files can be imported into NeuroExplorer for further processing. Once the file converter is installed, the option to convert the file to .nex fomat appears in the right-click menu.
  • Page 23 160032 double t_amplifier 1x1200240 9601920 double t_aux_input 1x300060 2400480 double t_supply_voltage 1x20004 160032 double >> frequency_parameters frequency_parameters = p.23 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 24 0 chip_channel: 0 port_name: ‘Port A’ port_prefix: ‘A’ port_number: 1 electrode_impedance_magnitude: 0 electrode_impedance_phase: 0 >> plot(t_amplifier, amplifier_data(1,:)) >> p.24 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 25: Temperature Sensor Data

    SmartProbe ™ packaging or SmartLink ™ headstages. p.25 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 26: Upsampling Waveform Data

    SOFTWARE Upsampling Waveform Data NeuroNexus provides an m-file for upsampling waveform data by a factor of two: upsample2x.m. Following is an example of upsampling amplifier data from the previous file from from 20 kS/s to 40 kS/s: >> [t_amplifier_2x, amplifier_data_2x] = upsample2x(t_amplifier, amplifier_data);...
  • Page 27 Subject to the foregoing, if the SmartBox ™ is not as warranted and is returned within 30 days of the discovery of the defect, NeuroNexus will, at its option, promptly repair or replace the defective SmartBox or refund the purchase price of the SmartBox .

  • Page 28: A Ppendix A: Add Ing A Led

    RHD2164 amplifier board and the 16-channel RHD2132 amplifier board with 18-pin electrode connector omit this connection to save space.) It is possible to control the auxout pin in real time using a selected digital input signal on the SmartBox . Under the “Configure” tab in the SmartBox ™...
  • Page 29 APPENDIX A There is a latency of 4-5 amplifier sampling periods (e.g., 200-250 μs with a sampling rate of 20 kS/s) from the digital input on the SmartBox to the ™ auxout pin on the selected amplifier board. Control of the digital output will only be active during data acquisition; the pin will be pulled to ground when acquisition stops.
  • Page 30 ±1.7 x 10 with 15-digit accuracy ±308 QString length-prefixed Unicode string (see below) 0 to 2,147,483,647 Unicode characters p.30 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 31 = length / 2; % convert length from bytes to 16-bit Unicode words for i = 1:length a(i) = fread(fid, 1, ‘uint16’); return p.31 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...

  • Page 32: A Ppendix B: Data File

    User-requested amplifier high-pass filter cutoff frequency (units: Hz) single Desired upper bandwidth User-requested amplifier low-pass filter cutoff frequency (units: Hz) p.32 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 33 Actual impedance test frequency Closest realizable electrode impedance test frequency (units: Hz) In the “Configure” tab of the SmartBox ™ GUI, there are three general-purpose text fields that may be used to enter notes on particular recording ses- sions. The contents of these text fields are saved here.
  • Page 34 Number of temperature sensors zero if the option for saving temperature data is not selected. The SmartBox also saves the “board mode”. This integer is set by FPGA digital input pins in the SmartBox . Currently, a board mode of zero indicates ™...
  • Page 35 3: SmartBox ADC input channel ™ 4: SmartBox ™ digital input channel 5: SmartBox digital output channel ™ p.35 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 36 This concludes the Standard Intan RHD2000 Header contents. Typical headers consume very little disk space (a few KB) even for large numbers of en- abled channels. p.36 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

  • Page 37: Traditional Intan Format

    RHD2000 Header and approximately N minutes of saved data. These .rhd data files may be read into MATLAB using read_Intan_RHD2000_file.m, which is provided on the Intan Technologies web site. This file format includes an option to save the temperature sensor readings from each SmartLink headstage attached to the SmartBox ™...
  • Page 38 APPENDIX B For each enabled SmartLink auxiliary input channel, there are 15 ADC samples. (The SmartBox ™ GUI software samples the SmartLink auxiliary inputs at one-fourth the sampling rate of the amplifiers.) 15 x int16 Auxiliary input voltage Units: ADC steps. To convert to volts, multiply by 0.0000374.

  • Page 39: One Signal Per Type" Format

    The following MATLAB code reads a timestamp data file and creates a time vector with units of seconds: p.39 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...
  • Page 40 = fopen(‘amplifier.dat’, ‘r’); v = fread(fid, [num_channels, num_samples], ‘int16’); fclose(fid); v = v * 0.195; % convert to microvolts p.40 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 41 This file contains a matrix of ADC samples from all enabled SmartLink auxiliary input channels in uint16 format. To convert to volts, multiply by 0.0000374. Although the SmartBox interface samples the SmartLink auxiliary input channels at one-fourth the rate of the amplifiers, each auxiliary input sample is ™...
  • Page 42 = v * 0.0000748; % convert to volts Board ADC input data file: auxin.dat This file contains a matrix of ADC samples from the analog inputs on the SmartBox , in uint16 format. To convert to volts, multiply by 0.000050354. (If ™...
  • Page 43 0, 4, and 5 are high and the rest low, the uint16 value for this sample time will be 20 + 24 + 25 = 1 + 16 + 32 = 49. If no board digital input channels are enabled in the GUI, this file will not be written. If any SmartBox digital inputs are enabled, the uint16 numbers in ™...

  • Page 44: One File Per Channel" Format

    “One File per Channel” Format This file format creates a subdirectory using the base filename provided, plus a date and time stamp. The subdirectory contains separate files for each waveform recorded by the SmartBox ™ ; if 256 amplifier channels are connected to the system, then 256 individual amplifier data files will be written.
  • Page 45 = dir(‘amp-B-003.dat’); num_samples = fileinfo.bytes/2; % int16 = 2 bytes fid = fopen(‘amp-B-003.dat’, ‘r’); v = fread(fid, num_samples, ‘int16’); p.45 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 | support@neuronexus.com...
  • Page 46 Each auxiliary input data file contains the consecutive ADC samples from one enabled SmartLink auxiliary input channel in uint16 format. To convert to volts, multiply by 0.0000374. Although the SmartBox software samples the SmartLink auxiliary input channels at one-fourth the rate of the amplifiers, each auxiliary input sample is ™...
  • Page 47 Each board ADC input data file has a filename that begins with board-ADC followed by the channel number. For example: board-ADC-00.dat, board- ADC-01.dat, or board-ADC-07.dat. Each board ADC input data file contains the consecutive ADC samples from one enabled analog input on the SmartBox , in uint16 format. To convert ™...
  • Page 48 Each board digital input data file has a filename that begins with board-DIN followed by the channel number. For example: board-DIN-00.dat, board- DIN-01.dat, or board-DIN-15.dat. Each board digital input data file contains the consecutive binary samples from one enabled digital input on the SmartBox , in uint16 format. Each ™...

  • Page 49: Handling Large Data Files

    Similar functions are available in C++ and other programming languages. p.49 NeuroNexus Technologies, Inc. ©2014 | 655 Fairfield Court, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, Michigan USA Telephone: +1.734.913.8858 | Fax: +1.734.786.0069 |...

Table of Contents