Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface (BCI) company Neuralink is seeking people for its first human trial.
The BBC reports that Neuralink’s goal is to connect human brains to computers and it wants to test its technology on people with paralysis.
A robot will help implant a BCI that will let people control a computer cursor, or type, using thoughts alone.
Rival firms have already implanted BCI devices in people.
Neuralink finally got FDA approval for its first human clinical trial, four months ago, a key milestone after earlier delays in obtaining approval.
The FDA approval represented “an important first step that will one day allow our technology to help many people”, said Neuralink.
The company had sought approval to implant its devices in ten people. The number authorized by the FDA is not known. The BBC explains:
At the start of the six-year study, a robot would be used to surgically place 64 flexible threads, thinner than a human hair, on to a part of the brain that controlled “movement intention”, the company said.
These allow Neuralink’s experimental N1 implant – powered by a battery that can be charged wirelessly – to record and transmit brain signals wirelessly to an app that decodes how the person intends to move.
The company says people may qualify for the trial if they have quadriplegia due to injury or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) – a disease in which the nerve cells in the spinal cord and brain degenerate.
While Mr Musk’s involvement raises the profile of Neuralink, he faces rivals, some with a track record dating back nearly two decades. Utah-based Blackrock Neurotech implanted its first of many BCIs in 2004.
Precision Neuroscience, formed by a Neuralink co-founder, also aims to help people with paralysis. And its implant resembles a very thin piece of tape that sits on the surface of the brain and can be implanted via a “cranial micro-slit”, which it says is a much simpler procedure.
Meanwhile, existing devices are generating results. In two separate recent US scientific studies, implants were used to monitor brain activity when a person tried to speak, which could then be decoded to help them communicate.
Dr Adrien Rapeaux, a research associate in the Neural Interfaces Lab at Imperial College London told the BBC that “Neuralink no doubt has an advantage in terms of implantation” as their procedure was robotically assisted.
But Dr Rapeaux who is also a co-founder of a neural implant start-up Mintneuro, said it wasn’t clear how their method for converting brain signals into useful actions would do better than that used by Blackrock Neurotech for example, and whether it is able to stay accurate and reliable over time, “a known issue in the field”.
Paralyzed people should not expect speedy access to these advances. The FDA commonly takes years to approve new drugs and medical devices, and thousands die awaiting FDA approval of new drugs. For example, the FDA didn’t approve a home test for HIV until 24 years after it first received an application. An FDA advisory committee noted that the test held “the potential to prevent the transmission of more than 4,000 new HIV infections in its first year of use alone.” So thousands of people got infected with AIDS as a result of the FDA’s slowness.
In other news, 90% of those with cystic fibrosis get a new lease on life with a new breakthrough drug.
Scientists recently engineered bionic silkworms that spin fibers six times stronger than Kevlar.
Scientists also recently came up with an “inverse vaccine” that has shown it can treat auto-immune diseases in a lab setting, creating hope that doctors will be able to use it to reverse devastating diseases like multiple sclerosis. But the FDA commonly takes years to approve new drugs and vaccines, so thousands will die waiting for the vaccine to be approved, even if it is perfected.
In other news, artificial wombs could be coming soon, to prevent premature babies from dying or being permanently disabled due to premature life outside the womb. Doctors are already beginning to do womb transplants. A woman who was previously unable to have children recently received her sister’s womb in the first womb transplant in the United Kingdom.
A new ultrasound therapy could help treat cancer and Alzheimer’s disease and skull implants could fight depression.
Doctors recently did the first robotic liver transplant in America. Robots can fit in small spaces in people’s bodies that a surgeon can’t reach without cutting through living tissue, or doing other collateral damage. Doctors recently used a robot to carry out incredibly complex spinal surgery.
Artificial intelligence is now developing highly-effective antibodies to fight disease. Doctors overseas are using artificial intelligence to detect cases of breast cancer more effectively.
Scientists recently developed a treatment for alcoholism that reduces drinking by 90% among lab monkeys.
