The brain implant company Neuralink von Elon Musk (51) says it has received FDA approval for human clinical trials. This is an important first step “that will one day enable our technology to help many people,” the Californian company wrote on Thursday (local time). Twitter. The aim is to network the human brain with a computer.
Musk, who is also Twitter boss, congratulated the team in the short message service. The search for subjects for the clinical study has not yet started, said Neuralink. More information will be available soon. The FDA has not yet commented on this.
In addition to the electric car manufacturer Tesla and the space company SpaceX The start-up Neuralink is one of the rather small projects of the 51-year-old tech billionaire Musk. The research facility, founded in 2016, develops technologies for the direct networking of people and computers using brain implants. For example, they should enable paraplegics who can neither move their arms nor legs to control their own smartphones by connecting their neurons to computers.
Several institutions and companies have been researching brain-computer interfaces (BCI) for years. The idea is to read human thoughts through technical circuits, process them and translate them into movement or language. If this succeeds, paralyzed people could use mind control to control an exoskeleton, for example, or people with locked-in syndrome could communicate with their outside world.
Brain surgery required for Neuralink implant
According to the US broadcaster CNBC, a brain operation is necessary for the use of the Neuralink implant. The so-called link is connected directly to the human tissue in the head with fine lines. External devices should then be able to be controlled wirelessly. Apart from a small scar under the hair, nothing should be visible on the outside later, Musk said in 2020 at the presentation of a prototype that Neuralink initially tested on pigs.
The presumed approval for testing on humans is already a success, wrote CNBC. So far, no company researching in the BCI area has received final market approval for a product.
Swiss researchers recently succeeded in getting a Dutchman, who was paralyzed after an accident, to walk again using electronic sensors in his head, spine and legs. How the experimental study works was published on Wednesday in the journal Nature.