The medical neurotechnology company Neuralink, established by Elon Musk, has successfully installed a brain implant in a human individual for the first time. Following the operation that took place on Sunday, the business magnate posted on X that the patient was making a full recovery. The preliminary findings indicate that identifying neural spikes is promising, he noted.
The implant developed by Neuralink is intended to enable individuals to use a smartphone and other technology through their brain activity.
In May 2023, Neuralink was granted permission to use the flat circular implant to conduct a clinical investigation with humans. Before this, the implant had been tested on monkeys. The implant includes one thousand and twenty-four electrodes, and a robot uses a very thin needle to connect them to the brain.
To conduct the clinical experiment, Neuralink focused exclusively on persons with tetraplegia, which means that they were paralysed in both their legs and their arms.
The activation of a certain brain region occurs as individuals begin to move. The electrodes pick up these impulses and should be adequate to visualise a movement that needs to be made to control anything, like a cursor on a computer.
Patients may require several months to learn how to control computers using their brain activity, even if their interventions are completely successful. The Neuralink clinical research is planned to be conducted for six years.
In December of 2022, Musk announced that a chip would be implanted within the next six months. Following the announcement made by the magnate during the ‘Neuralink Show and Tell’ event, the programme required additional time to be built. According to the creator of SpaceX, it is comparable to replacing a portion of one’s skull with a smartwatch. He did not provide a more appropriate parallel. According to him, the company is certain that it will be ready to implant a chip inside a human within the next six months. He said that the company wants to ensure that the chip functions flawlessly before it is implanted in a human being.
Neuralink was granted permission by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States of America to carry out its initial clinical research on humans in May 2023. It is an important first step that will one day allow its technology to aid many people, the company tweeted on that occasion.
