Generating Realistic Meshes of Neuron Models

Brain cells, known as neurons, transmit electrical signals upon receiving sufficient stimulation. These signals can be modulated using device electric fields (E-fields) for therapeutic benefit. Treatments such as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) rely on coils and electrodes to stimulate the brain, treating depression, smoking addiction, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. In silico models relying on our in-house adjoint boundary element method (BEM) solver can be used to fully couple membrane electric currents with device E-fields (Czerwonky et al, “Integral Equation for Analyzing Neuron Response to Non-invasive Electromagnetic Brain Stimulation,” ACES 2023). However, it requires watertight meshes of neuron geometry. We present several algorithms for generating meshes of realistic neuron morphologies and stimulating them using BEM.