Nicolas Valentin completed a Master's Degree in the department of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University in 2012. At VNEL, his research focused on determining whether a commercially available cochlear implant stimulator could be adapted for use as a vestibular implant. The prototype vestibular implant system resulting from his work became a basis for the MVI(TM) multichannel vestibular implant now being evaluated in a first-in-human trial at VNEL.
Prior to joining VNEL, he received his undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering from the California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, with emphasis in control & robotics, communications & signal processing, and instrumentation. He also completed the Post-Baccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP) in biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins, during which he worked as a research technologist in the Neuroengineering and Biomedical Instrumentation Lab under the guidance of Dr. Nitish Thakor and Dr. Xiaofeng Jia. His main research project there focused on the study of therapeutic hypothermia after cardiac arrest. In a parallel project, he investigated the neurological changes resulting from septic encephalopathy and explored potential methodologies for early diagnosis, treatment and prognosis.
Since 2012, Nic has been a System Engineer at Labyrinth Devices, LLC, a medical device company dedicated to helping people living with vestibular disorders, by bringing vestibular implant technology and improved vestibular diagnostic systems into clinical practice.
THESIS
Valentin NS (2012) Development of a Human-Implantable Multi-Channel Vestibular Prosthesis Prototype by Modification of a Commercially Available Cochlear Implant. Master’s Thesis. Johns Hopkins University Department of Biomedical Engineering
PEER REVIEWED ARTICLES
Peter J. Boutros; NicolasValentin; Kristin N. Hageman; Dale Roberts; Chenkai Dai; Charles C. Della Santina (Aug 2016) “Temporal Discretization Errors Produce Minimal Effects on Vestibular Prosthesis Performance”, J. Med. Devices. 2016;10(3):030958-030958-3.
Valentin NS, Hageman KN, Dai C, Della Santina CC, Fridman GY. (2013) “Development of a multichannel vestibular prosthesis prototype by modification of a commercially available cochlear implant” IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2013 Sep;21(5):830-9. doi: 10.1109/TNSRE.2013.2259261. PubMed PMID: 23649285; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC4050179. (free copy here)
Ying Ma, Yong Hu, Nicolas Valentin, Romergryko Geocadin, Nitish V. Thakor, Xiaofeng Jia. (2011) “Time Jitter of Somatosensory Evoked Potentials in Recovery from Hypoxic–ischemic Brain Injury.” Journal of Neuroscience Methods 2011 Oct 15; 201(2):355-360. Epub 2011 Aug 22
CONFERENCE ABSTRACTS & PRESENTATIONS
Peter J. Boutros, Nicolas S. Valentin, Dale Roberts, Kristin N. Hageman, Chenkai Dai, Charles C. Della Santina, “Temporal Discretization Inherent to Continuous Interleaved Sampling Stimulation Causes Negligible Effects on Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex Responses Elicited in Rhesus Monkeys,” ARO 2016
Della Santina CC, Fridman GY, Dai C, Davidovics NS, Chiang B, Rahman MA, Mitchell D, Cullen KE, Kalayjian Z, Andreou A, Migliaccio AA, Hayden R, Melvin TA, Lie T, Ahn JH, Sun D, Jones N, Valentin N, “Restoring the Sixth Sense in 3D: An Update on the Johns Hopkins Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis Project,” ARO 2011 Annual Meeting abstract #264
Nicolas S. Valentin, Chenkai Dai, JoongHo Ahn, Charles C. Della Santina, Gene Y. Fridman. Development of a Human-Implantable Multichannel Vestibular Prosthesis via Modification of a Commercially Available Cochlear Implant. 35th Midwinter Meeting - The Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO). February 25-29, 2012. San Diego, CA
Ying Ma, Yong Hu, Nicolas Valentin, Romergryko Geocadin, Xiaofeng Jia. Evaluate Post-resuscitation Functional Outcome with Variance Analysis of Somatosensory Evoked Potentials. 9th Annual Neurocritical Care Society Meeting. September 21-24, 2011, QC, Canada
Ying MA, Yong Hu, Nicolas Valentin, Nitish V. Thakor, Xiaofeng Jia. Variance Analysis of Somatosensory Evoked Potentials and Functional Recovery after Cardiac Arrest. International Society of Heart research - North American Section Meeting ISHR-NAS 2011: Developing Novel Heart Failure Therapeutics. May 22-25, 2011. Philadelphia, PA
Nicolas S. Valentin, Nitish V. Thakor, Xiaofeng Jia. "Rodent injury models for Global Cerebral Ischemia and Septic Encephalopathy." Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Graduate Student Association 14th annual poster session, awarded 1st place in Post-Baccalaureate Category. April 7th, 2010. Baltimore, MD