1.It might sound like the work of science fiction, but what if you could control your phone or computer using only the power of your mind? One of the world’s richest men has announced his company, Neuralink, has successfully implanted a computer chip inside a human brain with the aim of doing just that.
2.Tech billionaire Elon Musk said on social media the chip was inserted on Sunday and the patient was now “recovering well”. He said the chip was designed to be recharged wirelessly and would enable people to control their phone or computer, and “almost any device, just by thinking”.
Who will be given the technology first?
3.Mr Musk, who also owns the social media platform X and is the founder of space agency SpaceX, said the first people to be given this technology would be those who had lost the use of their limbs. He previously said he hoped the brain chip could cure a range of conditions including obesity, autism, depression and schizophrenia as well as being used for internet browsing and telepathy.
4.It’s not the first time a human has received a brain chip implant, a company in Utah in the US did this 20 years ago in 2004, but because of Mr Musk’s high public profile, it is likely to be the most well-known example of this technology. Neuralink says it was given permission by the US medical watchdog, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), to test its brain chips on humans, after an earlier refusal.
How does it work?
5.The company said it would use a robot to place 64 super thin and flexible threads, slimmer than a strand of human hair, on the part of the brain that controls “movement intention” – the part that tells other parts of the body what to do.
6. These threads are designed to record and transmit brain signals to an app on the device you want to control. The app is then meant to decode the brain signals and work out what you wanted the device to do. Posting on X, formerly known as Twitter, Mr Musk said it was early days but so far there had been some “promising” brain activity detected by the technology.
Are you enthusiastic about technology which potentially merges humans and machines? What excites you about it / What are your major concerns?
7.The company has not commented on any negative side effects to its testing but in 2022 the FDA refused Neuralink permission to test its chip on humans because of concerns about the potential for the wires to move inside the brain, and the challenge of removing it without causing damage to the brain.
8.The fact the firm has since gained FDA permission suggests the concerns have likely been dealt with, although the long-term effects of having a device implanted in the brain aren’t yet known.
Did Neuralink test on animals?
9.To get the chip to this point, the company has done a lot of testing on animals. A complaint made to US officials in February 2023 raised concerns about the potentially cruel treatment of monkeys being used to test the technology, which Neuralink denied. The BBC has asked Neuralink and the FDA for comment.
