2024-02-04 23:39:02
The tycoon Elon Musk announced this Monday in your X account (formerly Twitter) than a team from your company Neuralink has implanted “the first brain chip in a human being.” The device is called Telepathy and its initial users will be those who have lost the use of his limbs.
Musk adds that “the patient is recovering well and initial results show promising neuronal spike detection.”
The news of the Neuralink implant comes nine months after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave approval for the company to begin human studies.
The function of the chip will be to ‘read’ brain activity in order to transmit orders that help restore some brain functions severely damaged after a heart attack or stroke. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosiswhich lead to serious damage to the communicative capacity.
Until now, brain implants have been developed in only one direction: from the brain to the outside (generally a computer that processes the signals), but the Neuralink project aims to be able to also transfer information in the other direction, towards the brain.
Until now, brain implants have developed from the brain outwards. This project aims to also be able to transfer information to the brain
The company is developing in parallel two types of implantsone for restore vision “even in those who have never had it” and another to restore basic bodily functions in people with paralysis due to damage to the spinal cord.
Musk described the product on his social network, noting that “allows you to control your phone or computer, and through them almost any device, just by thinking”.
Little else is known about the product. In 2021, Neuralink published a video on YouTube in which a monkey with a chip implanted in its brain appeared playing a video game that it controlled from its mind.
In the three-and-a-half-minute video, the nine-year-old macaque Pager plays a version of the classic video game Pong and every time he guesses correctly he receives a banana shake that is given to him through a straw as compensation.
Musk assured that the monkey “is literally playing the video game.” telepathically using a brain chip.”
A few months earlier, Neuralink successfully tested a chip in pigs that, implanted in the skull, allowed the animals’ brain activity to be measured.
Expert opinion
In an assessment published by the SMC UK, Tara Spires-Jonespresident of the British Neuroscience Association, points out that “the idea of a brain-machine interface like Neuralink has existed for some time, with several companies and many scientists working in this area.”
Spiers-Jones adds that “In recent trials – not related to Neuralink – a scientific team managed to implement cerebrospinal interfaces that helped people with paralysis walk”.
The company owned by Musk has not published its results in any study. Nor is anything known “about its participants, or the specific objective of the trial.”
However, “most of these interfaces require invasive neurosurgery and they are still in the experimental phase, so it will likely be many years before they are widely available,” he adds.
The company owned by Musk has not published its results in any study. Nor is anything known “about its participants, or the specific objective of the trial,” he also indicated to the SMC UK. Anne Vanhoestenberghean expert in implantable medical devices at King’s College London.
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