DailyDirt: Braiiins... And Brain Implants
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
Cyborgs are already walking among us -- if you count people who have advanced pacemakers and other implanted devices (eg. insulin pumps, cochlear implants, etc). There are also a handful of folks who are actively trying to become cyborgs, like Kevin Warwick. However, brain implants still need to be a lot less invasive and traumatic if anyone is going to really get a direct, permanent brain interface. Here are just a few links on neuro-interfaces that are making some progress.- Cyborg rodents with spinal cord injuries can walk again thanks to implanted neural interfaces and flexible silicone wiring. This kind of research is still quite far away from being used in human patients, but it's promising work that could someday lead to amazing computer-brain interfaces. [url]
- The Utah Array is a chip that can be implanted in a person's brain and receive signals to do things such as control prosthetic limbs. There are also other kinds of neuroprosthetics that are similar (eg. Michigan array and NeuroProbes arrays), but these devices aren't exactly ready to replace smartphones just yet. [url]
- One woman has a brain implant that controls her epilepsy by scanning her brain for signs of a seizure and then stimulating her brain to interrupt it. Sixteen other patients have also been fitted with commercial neurostimulators, and doctors are learning more and more about how brain activity works with these implants. [url]
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Filed Under: brain, brain implants, cyborg, epilepsy, kevin warwick, michigan array, neural interfaces, neuroprobes array, neurostimulators, prosthetic limbs, utah array
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Re:
Rest assured that all future implants will be WiFi enabled (or whatever the equivalent is when the implants are perfected), since it's apparently against the law now to create any electronic device that doesn't connect to the net.
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Michael Crichton, 1972: The Terminal Man
Not one of his better books, but Crichton was both an MD and a Computer Science grad, which gave the story technical versimilitude anyway.
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implanted/stalekd with harssment called offender ilegally!
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