Some animals can enter a hibernation state, which slows down their biological processes and reduces their metabolic rate, allowing them to survive harsh environments and conditions. Inspired by this natural survival strategy, the concept of artificial hibernation has been a long-standing dream in human history. It is believed to be a game-changing technology for rescuing patients' lives threatened by life-threatening diseases such as stroke or heart attack by slowing down or even pausing life and disease progression.

In 2023, we developed a new artificial hibernation technology (Nature Metabolism, 2023) by modulating hibernation-inducing neurons in the brain using remote and precise ultrasound stimulation. We are now investigating its potential therapeutic benefits, including but not limited to slowing down tumor progression, resetting the immune system, and decelerating the aging process.

Neuromodulation technology is essential for treating brain diseases and understanding brain function. However, existing technologies face the challenge of achieving noninvasive and precise modulation. Sonogenetics is a new technology that uses ultrasound to control genetically engineered neurons, which allow us to selectively activating specific types of neurons. In 2021, we developed the first TRPV1-mediated sonogenetics (Brain Stimulation, 2021) and demonstrated its capability to achieve cell-type selective neuromodulation and control mouse behavior. In 2024, we proposed the next generation of sonogenetics (PNAS, 2024), allowing for targeting arbitrary brain regions with unprecedented precision and flexibility.

An alternative way to control brain activity is to precisely deliver drugs to targeted brain regions. Ultrasound can vibrate microbubbles (a clinically approved agent injected into the bloodstream) to induce a cavitation effect, which pushes and pulls the blood vessel walls. Harnessing this physical effect, we can deliver drugs and nanoparticles to targeted brain regions with high precision. We have developed multiple imaging modalities, including MRI (Radiology, 2021), ultrasound (Scientific Reports, 2019), and PET (Scientific Reports, 2019), to better guide, monitor, and evaluate this process.

As a noninvasive, precise, and safe physical wave, ultrasound is demonstrating its great potential for facilitating fundamental neuroscience discoveries, clinical translations, and daily applications. The fundamental challenge lies in developing ultrasound devices that are wearable, flexible, and easy to use. To address this, we are developing new ultrasound transducers (IEEE BME, 2017; IEEE BME, 2022), holograms (PNAS, 2024), and imaging systems (Scientific Reports, 2019).