Brain may be able to rewire itself to control prosthetics
Scientists have spent years trying to figure out which areas in the brain to attach implants to control prosthetic limbs for paralyzed patients. A new study suggests that the brain can actually learn to rewire signals to prosthetics when attached to nearly any single brain cell.
The University of Washington study used macaque monkeys whose arms were temporarily paralyzed for the experiment. Then implants were attached to a random nerve cell that sent signals to an electrode that was used to stimulate the wrist muscles.
The macaques were tasked with playing a video game that receives input from moving their wrists. In only their second session of trying to control their wrist using the implant, the monkeys managed to stimulate the correct neuron and move the muscle. The brain actually rerouted the signal to the random neuron that controls the muscle.
The thing that astounded University of Washington researchers was that the experiment worked with basically any random nerve cell. Lead Researcher Chet Moritz found, “remarkably, that nearly every neuron we tested in the brain could be used to control this kind of stimulation.”
The study could have a profound effect on research intended to help people with spinal cord injuries receive neural implants. With advances such as this, scientists believe that we could start seeing such implants in humans in as few as 5 years.
Previous attempts at neural prosthetics centered on locating the area of the brain responsible for stimulating a particular muscle. Armed with fresh knowledge about how the brain learns to control muscles, researchers now hope to design brain implants that are much less invasive.
Combined with using electrodes to directly stimulate muscle groups, this approach demonstrates cutting-edge prosthetic research. Many hope that this study could help light the way to literally bringing paralyzed limbs back to life.
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