"Musk's startup Neuralink Corp.
should be ready to test its technology on humans in six months, the
entrepreneur said Wednesday during a live-streamed update about progress the
company has made with its brain-implant technology.
Neuralink has submitted most of its
paperwork to the Food and Drug Administration, which oversees medical devices,
including neural implants, Mr. Musk said.
The company wants to help restore
vision and enable people with severe disabilities to move and communicate by
decoding brain activity.
Eventually, Mr. Musk said, Neuralink
wants to open clinics where patients could get a device implanted into their
brains by surgical robots, which the company also showcased Wednesday.
Mr. Musk showed a video of
"telepathic typing" from a monkey that has a Neuralink brain implant.
The animal wasn't typing into a keyboard but was able to move a cursor to
images of letters. "He's moving the cursor with his mind," he said.
"He can't actually spell. I don't want to oversell this thing," he
said.
Neuralink has been testing its
implant technology on nonhuman primates for several years, including in April
2021, when the company released a video showing that a monkey implanted with
two Neuralink devices could play Pong as the device translated its brain
activity into commands with machine-learning software.
Clinical testing that proves an
implantable device is safe and effective long-term would be necessary before a
brain-computer interface, like Neuralink's, could be widely rolled out to
patients." [1]
1. Billionaire's Startup Sees Human Tests In 6 Months
Hernandez, Daniela.
Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 01 Dec 2022: B.5.