Musk’s Neuralink eyes more test subjects for its brain tech
Elon Musk on Wednesday said his Neuralink startup is “moving on” to a second test patient as its tech for linking brains and computers improves.
Musk and members of the Neuralink team fielded questions during an update streamed on X, formerly Twitter, discussing where it is on the path to making its brain implants commonplace.
“We’re only just moving now to our second Neuralink patient,” Musk said. “But we hope to have, if things go well, high single digits this year.”
Musk’s neurotechnology company in January installed a brain implant in Noland Arbaugh, which the billionaire head of Tesla and X touted as a success.
Arbaugh was left paralyzed from the shoulders down by a diving accident eight years ago.
Since the implant operation, he has told of playing chess and the video game “Civilization,” as well as taking Japanese and French lessons by controlling a computer screen cursor with his brain.
Musk and members of the Neuralink team detailed fixing an issue that saw Arbaugh’s ability to move a computer cursor with his mind greatly reduced.
Neuralink’s technology works through a device about the size of five stacked coins that is placed inside the human brain by a robotic surgeon.
Threads connecting the implant to Arbaugh’s brain had “retracted,” becoming less effective at picking up signals.
Threads will be implanted deeper in the brain and at varying depths, with ramped-up precision to maximize effectiveness, according to the Neuralink team.
Musk promised “it’s only going to get better from here.”
One goal is to escalate the bandwidth of the link between the brain and computer, allowing more data to move faster, according to Musk.
“Quite important for human-AI symbiosis is just being able to communicate at a speed AI can follow,” Musk said of brains being connected to computers with artificial intelligence.
Musk envisions Neuralink implants going beyond restoring sight to the blind to giving people infrared or ultraviolet vision or letting them share concepts with others telepathically.
“We want to give people superpowers,” Musk said. “Not just that we’re restoring your prior functionality, but that you actually have functionality far greater than a normal human.”
Musk spoke of developing an automated process in which Neuralink’s surgery robot could quickly install custom implants in people seeking “upgrades.”
“It’s very sort of ‘Cyberpunk’ or ‘Deus Ex,’ if you play those games,” Musk said of the idea.
“An exciting possibility long term also is to take parts of the Optimus humanoid robot and combine that with a Neuralink – you could have basically cybernetic superpowers,” he said.
Musk cofounded Neuralink in 2016.
The ambition is to supercharge human capabilities, treat neurological disorders like ALS or Parkinson’s, and maybe one day achieve a symbiotic relationship between humans and AI.
Musk is not alone in trying to make advances in the field, which is officially known as brain-machine or brain-computer interface research.
A smartphone with a Neuralink logo displayed is placed on a computer motherboard in this illustration taken on May 15, 2024.
The tiny wires of Neuralink's brain chip implant used in the first participant in a trial run by Elon Musk's company have become "more or less very stable", a company executive said on Wednesday (July 10).
The company had in May said that a number of tiny wires inside the brain of Noland Arbaugh, who is paralysed from the shoulders down due to a 2016 diving accident, had pulled out of position.
"Once you do the brain surgery it takes some time for the tissues to come in and anchor the threads in place, and once that happens, everything has been stable," said Neuralink executive Dongjin "D.J." Seo.
So far, Arbaugh, based in Arizona, was the only patient to have received the implant, but Musk said he hopes to have participants in the high single digits this year.
The company is now taking risk mitigation measures such as skull sculpting and reducing carbon dioxide concentration in the blood to normal level in patients, the company's executives said in a live stream on social media platform X.
"In upcoming implants, our plan is to sculpt the surface of the skull very intentionally to minimise the gap under the implant... that will put it closer to the brain and eliminate some of the tension on the threads," Matthew MacDougall, Neuralink's head of neurosurgery, said.
Neuralink is testing its implant to give paralysed patients the ability to use digital devices by thinking alone. The device works by using tiny wires, which are thinner than a human hair, to capture signals from the brain and translating those into actions such as moving a mouse cursor on a computer screen.
Musk said during the livestream that the device doesn't harm the brain. The US Food and Drug Administration, in initially considering the device years ago, had raised safety concerns, but ultimately granted the company a green light last year to begin human trials.
So far, the device has allowed Arbaugh to play video games, browse the internet and move a cursor on his laptop by thinking alone, according to the company's blog posts and videos.
Neuralink is also working on a new device that it believes will require half the number of electrodes to be implanted in the brain to make it more efficient and powerful, the executives said.
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