In six months, Elon Musk's startup is expected to begin human trials for a brain-computer implant.
One of Musk's five businesses is developing a method for implanting thousands of electrodes into the surface of people's brains that are thousands of times thinner than a human hair. Each electrode consists of a small wire connected to a battery-powered, wirelessly recharged quarter-sized chip package, which is inserted into the space where a circle of skulls once stood. The N1 chip uses wireless technology to connect with the outside world.
While Musk's ultimate goal of using Neuralink to socialize with superintelligent AI is still a ways away, the technology is still a ways away from its initial medical applications. But the company said in a "show and tell" event that lasted more than two hours that it was making significant progress, including applying with the Food and Drug Administration to begin human trials, which could be completed within six months. is expected to commence.
According to Dan Adams, a researcher at Neuralink who is working on a project to repackage camera data into a brain-compatible format and pipe it directly into the visual cortex, "Our goal is to turn on the light for someone who Must be someone who has spent decades living in the dark.
Musk has some credibility when it comes to cutting-edge technology. His reusable rocket company SpaceX and electric car company Tesla both significantly changed the automotive industry. However, the chaos that followed Twitter's $44 billion acquisition has hurt his reputation as a tech genius. Additionally, Musk's Boring Company, which uses tunnels to re-imagine auto transportation, has yet to deliver on its promises.
It doesn't seem like Neuralink is any simpler than social networking. There are a lot of technical, legal and ethical challenges involved in connecting computer hardware to our own wetware. A digital feed directly into our brains may not be helpful for those of us who already spend way too much time on our phones, but helping the blind see is one thing.
Quadriplegics will be able to walk thanks to Neuralink technology.
At Neuralink's "show and tell" event to recruit new employees, the company demonstrated a new trick: Sake, a monkey that used its mind to follow cues and type on a virtual keyboard. Their implants charge wirelessly, with the monkeys being enticed with fruit smoothies to sit under a charger attached to a branch directly above their heads.
However, in one of the most important developments on Thursday, those same electrodes were used to send signals back to the neurons that make up our brain and nervous system.
One experiment used electrodes in the spinal cord of a pig to control various leg movements, a technique that could eventually help quadriplegic people walk or use their hands. The Neuralink approach involves not only intercepting the brain's movement commands and directing them to the legs, but also listening to sensory signals from those extremities and transmitting them to the brain so the brain knows what's happening.
"We still have a lot of work to do to make this full vision a reality," said Joy O'Doherty, a researcher working on Neuralink's motor control technology.
visualizing images and typing mentally
Another experiment fed camera-captured visual data into a monkey's visual cortex, displaying virtual flashes that the monkey misinterpreted as being in different locations. Neuralink hopes this technology will lead to the development of a visual prosthesis for the blind.
The first generation Neuralink technology has 1,024 electrodes, but the company demonstrated a next-generation model with more than 16,000 electrodes. This much detail, according to Adams, would significantly improve the fidelity of the image a blind person could see.
"If you put a device on both sides of your visual cortex, you would have 32,000 points of light to form an image in a blind person," Adams explained.
Another Neuralink application allows paralyzed people to use their implants to type with their mind.
"We believe that someone who doesn't have any other interface to the outside world will be able to control their phone in a better way with working hands," Musk said.
Neuralink is not alone.
Neuralink is not the only company pursuing brain-machine interface (BMI) or brain-computer interface (BCI) technology. Academic researchers continue to publish research papers, and startups such as BlackRock Neurotech, Synchron and Paradromics are also active. Some, like Neuro, use non-invasive approaches that don't require surgery. The goal of mass production sets Neuralink apart from some of those efforts.
"Production is difficult - I would say 100 to 1000 times more difficult to go from a prototype to a device that is safe, reliable, working in a variety of conditions, affordable and mass-produced," Musk said. "It's incredibly difficult."
Musk envisions Neuralink making millions of brain chips and says he plans to buy one himself. To achieve that goal, the company is striving to automate as much of the technology as possible. Its R1 robot inserts electrodes into the brain without damaging blood vessels, but a future machine will handle more surgery, including cutting open the skull.
Neuralink is also working on implanting its brain chips a layer deeper, outside the layer known as the dura. This required significant changes to the robot's needles and needle steering system, which the company is currently working on.
"There are not many neurosurgeons here -- maybe 10 for every million people," said Christine Odabashian, who leads Neuralink's surgery engineering team. "We need to figure out how a neurosurgeon can oversee multiple procedures at the same time in order to find the best one and an inexpensive and accessible procedure."
Musk's future vision for Neuralink
Another key difference between Neuralink and its rivals is Musk's sci-fi vision.
Musk's company has lofty goals: "a generalized input-output device that can interface with every aspect of your brain," he says. However, the long-term strategy is much more grandiose.
"What are we going to do about AI, artificial general intelligence?" Kasturi asked. "How do we mitigate the risk of digital superintendence, which is far smarter than any human? How do we go along for the ride in a benign landscape where AI is very lenient? How can we get involved?"
The answer, in Musk's mind — not only conceptually for the time being, but possibly physically as well — is Neuralink.
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