Brain implant problem solved, says Elon Musk’s Neuralink – Firstpost

Neuralink, the brain implant company owned by Elon Musk, said it had fixed an issue that significantly reduced its first patient’s ability to move a computer cursor.

Musk’s neurotechnology company in January installed a brain implant in Noland Arbaugh, the company’s first human test subject, which the billionaire Tesla and X boss touted as a success.

Arbaugh was paralyzed from the shoulders down due to a diving accident eight years ago.

Shortly after the implant operation, he talked about playing chess and the video game “Civilization,” as well as taking Japanese and French lessons by controlling the cursor on a computer screen with his brain.

Neuralink’s technology works through a device the size of five stacked coins that is placed inside the human brain through invasive surgery, the threads of which are a key component for signal collection.

A company blog post on Wednesday said the threads connecting the implant to Arbaugh’s brain recently “retracted…resulting in a net decrease in the number of effective electrodes” and in the patient’s ability to operate the cursor.

While it offered no explanation for the threads receding, the company said it made modifications to make the implant more sensitive to neural signals.

This, along with other improvements, “produced a rapid and sustained improvement in bits per second, which has now surpassed Noland’s initial performance.”

The drop in the implant’s efficiency was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

The startup, co-founded by Musk in 2016, aims to build direct communication channels between the brain and computers.

The ambition is to enhance human capabilities, treat neurological disorders such as ALS or Parkinson’s and perhaps one day achieve a symbiotic relationship between humans and artificial intelligence.

Musk is not the only one trying to make progress in this field, which is officially known as brain-machine interface or brain-computer research.