IT Exam | Neuralink: what’s going on with brain implants from Elon Musk’s company?

In March, Neuralink showed its first human patient, 29-year-old Noland Arbaugh, using one of its brain implants to control a computer. 100 days after the implant was placed, Elon Musk’s company reveals the progress made in a new publication on its official website, but also some of the problems encountered.

The publication comes after the Wall Street Journal having reported that the implant was not working as desired and that the volume of data captured could be lower than that captured. As reported by the newspaper, some of the wires connecting the implant to the brain were disconnected, negatively impacting data capture.

According to Neuralink, a number of wires from the implant came out, possibly due to air remaining inside the patient’s skull after surgery. This condition would not pose any danger to his health, so the possibility of removing the implant was not even considered.

However, some of the wires ended up retracting, leading to a reduction in bits-per-second, that is, a measure of the speed and precision of a computer’s ability to control thoughts.

Despite this degradation in capabilities, Neuralink went ahead with a live public demonstration of what it would be possible to do with the implant, with Noland Arbaugh being able to play chess thanks to this system. The patient has even done live streaming on the social network X where he shows himself controlling computers and playing games.

To correct the problem, the company modified the implemented algorithm and made improvements to the techniques used to ‘translate’ the signals emitted by the brain into cursor movements on the computer, as well as to the interface used. “These adjustments led to a rapid and continued improvement in bits-per-second that has now exceeded the initial performance” recorded by Arbaugh, says Neuralink.

Apparently, Neuralink wants to place two more implants in the coming months, after completing a round of safety verification on this first patient.

Remember that Neuralink’s N1 implant contains a processor, a battery and a communications system, inside a small container the size of a coin and from which 64 wires come out, each one thinner than a human hair and containing 16 electrodes. . These wires end up entering the brain’s motor cortex, where electrodes read and retransmit neuronal signals that can be decoded to gauge patients’ intentions.