'Neural Bypass' Links Brain To Hand To Get Around Paralysis (ieee.org) 37
An anonymous reader writes: People who are paralyzed from a spinal cord injury still generate movement commands in their brains, but those commands can't travel down their spinal cords and peripheral nerves to reach their muscles. So biomedical engineers came up with a "neural bypass" to route brain signals around the roadblock. The system has just been demonstrated by a human patient for the first time. The patient has a brain implant to record signals from his motor cortex which are sent to a computer, where a decoder algorithm figures out which signals correspond to which specific imagined movements. It then sends a command to a sleeve of electrodes the patient wears on his forearm, which stimulates his muscles in precise patterns to produce the desired hand movement. The patient has already poured from a bottle, stirred with a swizzle stick, swiped a credit card, and played Guitar Hero.
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I imagine that they weren't really lacking for crippled people to try it out on. It's not like paralysis is a scare resource.
They got a test subject, and this patient now has the ability to eventually get a device that will allow their paralysis to be overcome. Not a shitty deal, really.
Re: Temporary Hope? (Score:1)
It doesn't matter who they got, the person deserves pay.
Do you do your job for free because they have other applicants?
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For the hope of helping research like this I would gladly volunteer.
If someone asked me to help test a procedure that would fix my knees I would be willing to pay some expenses myself, even if I didn't get to benefit in my lifetime.
Why? Because not everyone in this world thinks about money, and I like opportunities to serve a 'greater good'.
There's a good chance this test subject jumped at the chance to help. :)
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There's a good chance this test subject jumped at the chance to help. :)
Wanna place a bet before we ask?
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*Whoosh*
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Then we concur that a paralyzed person can jump at a something or a blind person can see the light.
Figuratively speaking of course. Gotta love Idioms. :)
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Oh boy he gets to spend thousands on a device they needed his help to make.
Why do you think swiping a credit card was one of the first things they made sure worked?
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Re:Temporary Hope? (Score:4, Informative)
Do not mistake this for a finished product. The main concern is that the implanted electrodes have a limited lifetime. It has gotten better, but it is still nowhere near "permanent". One of the motivation for such experiments is to find the minimal intrusiveness for the implanted electrodes that still allows them to record the signals with the required accuracy. Expect at least 10 more years and possibly much longer before the electrodes become long-term usable.
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Alas, there is always a catch with these stories. It is no wonder that everyone here is a cynic. Hard to get excited about anything when there is always fine print saying "Not for another decade".
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I think the problem is "reporters" and PR-people that feel they must make everything a world-shattering story. Of course, the other half of the problem is people that are ready believe such things. Even this /. thread if full of them.
The story describes progress, but actual research takes time, often a lot of it and "brain/nerve interfaces" are still in an early stage. For example, Cochlea-Implants were pioneered in the 1960, are commonplace today, but still only have a lifetime of 15-20 years and need to b
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That's a crazy idea: that you could be a puppeteer of a "vegetable".
Presumably a fully-able human could do this through VR on some sort of omnidirectional treadmill. (The "puppet" would walk around and do things, but possibly controlled by someone far away.)
Yes, it's way easier to do this with a robot, but consider the creepy factor. Or perhaps even control someone that is drugged in the right way...
The real fun... (Score:1)
Is being able to self-cuckold by banging your wife with somebody else's body.
I'm sure there would be a market for this. Imagine if you could get a steady supply of DDF 'braindead' corpses from repressive regimes across the globe. Productize these 'vegetables' or 'zombie people' by installing neural chips triggering signals in their lower brain/spine, either replace their eyes with webcams, or tap directly into their optic nerves for realtime streaming to your VR headset or visual override neural implant.
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It's not going to be that useful until you can transport the sensations back across the internet. Problem is, when they invent that tech, they're just going to use it to let people stay home and blow themselves and there goes civilization...
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This is a whole new world of necrophilia
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Presumably a fully-able human could do this through VR on some sort of omnidirectional treadmill. (The "puppet" would walk around and do things, but possibly controlled by someone far away.)
You mean like the corporations and politicians? They are already doing this.
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Kind of a large leap, but could they eventually use this to connect parapalegics to brain dead surrogates?
At Last! A way to re-animate Congress!
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Even if you could, the connection aspect would not be your only worry. Brain death usually leads to death of the remaining body in fairly short order, due to complications from a fairly large piece of decaying goo in the former person's skull. The rest of the body goes on, but those brain cells are dead, and start decaying.
I was under the impression that with heart-lung machines, tube feeding etc. they could keep patients with very little to no brain activity alive for quite some time, but doctors just pull the plug because there's nobody home. From what I understand they don't operate out dead goo even when people have had massive brain strokes, the dead parts are just gone. Is that wrong? Has there been any actual research on keeping the brain dead "alive"?
Obligatory (Score:1)
But if you use this to masturbate, does it feel like a stranger?
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I was thinking of those paralyzed below the waist and how this tech is needed not for their arms but between their legs.
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Body control (Score:2)
One part of this consist in controlling a body's movements with an external device - the fact that this device is in turn controlled by the brain occupying the body is another part, but it doesn't have to be that way, obviously. IOW, it is now possible, if not easy, to take control of other people's bodies. Just imagine the potential; it isn't all good.
A Race (Score:2)
Think of Rey (Score:3)
"But what about...?"
"I'd try it out on a hot dog first."