Neuralink: Brain-Machine Interfaces

Neuralink is a techno-neurological company based in America that studies and develops brain-machine interfaces, or BMIs. Researchers at Neuralink have shown that humans can demonstrate prosthetic control of computer cursors, motorized limbs, and speech synthesizers using no less than 256 "electrodes". These BMIs have been limited by the inability and difficulty of recording from large numbers of specific, hard-to-reach neurons.

Through non-invasive methods, like placing the electrodes on the skull, allows these results to be recorded, but the signals are frequently distorted and nonspecific. Electrodes placed on the cortex still cannot read deeper-brain signals. This presented Neuralink with 2 options for construction of the forcibly-invasive in-brain electrodes. They could either use arrays of a rigid metal, or flexible strips of probes. The rigid metal lowered the lifespan of the electrodes, but the polymer strips required a more advanced injection method.

A neurosurgical robot they developed can quickly insert these strips into the brain in several brain regions. This process results in either 48 or 96 threads, each with 32 electrodes. This multiplies into 3072 electrodes, 12 times as many as was necessary to move limbs and talk artificially. What could you do with these 2816 additional electrodes? Perhaps paint with your mind. Create music from the snippets of ideas in your head. Control RC cars and planes, maybe control your own car.