Patch-clamp amplifiers on a chip.

We present the first, fully integrated, two-channel implementation of a patch-clamp measurement system. With this "PatchChip" two simultaneous whole-cell recordings can be obtained with rms noise of 8pA in a 10kHz bandwidth. The capacitance and series-resistance of the electrode can be compensated up to 10pF and 100MΩ respectively under computer control. Recordings of hERG and Na(v) 1.7 currents demonstrate the system's capabilities, which are on par with large, commercial patch-clamp instrumentation. By reducing patch-clamp amplifiers to a millimeter size micro-chip, this work paves the way to the realization of massively parallel, high-throughput patch-clamp systems for drug screening and ion-channel research. The PatchChip is implemented in a 0.5μm silicon-on-sapphire process; its size is 3×3mm(2) and the power consumption is 5mW per channel with a 3.3V power supply. Copyright 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.