Click, speak, move: these brain implants are ready to help people with disabilities

People who have lost the ability to move or speak can soon have a new option: surgically implanted devices that link the brain to a computer.

More than two decades after researchers for the first time demonstrated That a person can move a computer cursor with his thoughts are different companies ready to the Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) From experimental curiosity to commercial product.

“We know it works, we know that the engaging technologies are now ready,” says Michael Mager, the CEO of Precision neuroscience. “It is time to turn this academic work into a thriving industry that can have a major impact on people’s lives.”

Experimental interfaces of the brain computer have already been implanted in dozens of people. The latest devices go under the skin and can communicate wirelessly with a smartphone or tablet.

Elon Musk’s No more than Is the most visible player in the BCI field. But the first product that reaches the market can be very good from competitors, including precision, BlackRock Neurotech” Paradromicor Synchronous.

Some of these companies, such as BlackRock, have much more experience than Neuralink. Others use less invasive and potentially safer, technology that can make it easier to get approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

The first BCI customers are probably people who live with paralyzing due to a spinal cord or Amyotrophe lateral sclerosis (If). Early products can operate a computer cursor, or Generate artificial speech.

Neuralink’s ‘Telepathy’

Planted BCIS work by detecting and decoding signals from areas of the brain that control movement or speech. These signals indicate when a person tries to move a limb or speak a word.

A BCI system usually includes sensors that detect brain activity, an interface that processes the signals and an external device that turns into action through thoughts. The result: a cursor moves, a prosthetic hand reaches, a synthetic voice speaks the words that a person tries to articulate.

“Imagine the joy to make contact with your loved ones, browse the internet or even play games with only your thoughts,” says the narrator of a Neuralink promotion video.

The company, which did not respond to requests for an interview, calls these possibilities ‘telepathy’.

Neuralink pushed BCIs into the public imagination at the beginning of 2024, thanks to a charismatic and resilient man with paralysis.

Noland Arbaugh left a diving accident unable to go down from the shoulders. On 29 he became the first person to get Neuralink’s device.

A robot screwed more than a thousand electrodes in the motor cortex of his brain at the Barrow Neurological Institute In Phoenix. Subsequently, human surgeons installed a wireless interface around the size of a quarter in his skull.

A few weeks later, Arbaugh stood on stage at Neuralink’s head office in Fremont, California, descriptive His experience in controlling a computer cursor.

“It’s Freakin” Wild, “he said. “When I moved it for the first time by thinking, it blew my mind for a day. I could just wrap my head around it.”

A video with the comments from Arbaugh has attracted more than 25 million views about the social media platform of Musk, X.

But the success was tempered by Neuralink’s announcement A few weeks later, some threads of electrodes were “withdrawn” in Arbaugh’s brain, making the device less sensitive.

Since then, Neuralink has reported that he implants his BCI with at least six other people. But details about those experiments remain scarce.

A new technology, decades old

Although the surgical robots of Neuralink and wireless electronics are new, the use of thoughts to move a cursor is not.

Dr. Leigh Hochberg – Those positions at Brown University and Massachusetts General Hospital – was part of a team that pioneered in 2004 in the approach.

Their subject was Matt Nagle, a man who lived with paralysis after he was stabbed. The Hochberg team connected the brain of Nagle to a computer with the help of old -fashioned threads that went through his skull.

An investigation video From 2004, Nagle shows with the help of his thoughts to open an e -mail.

“It was exactly what had to happen,” says Hochberg. “And even for all of us who expected it – there was a bit of magic there.”

Nagle died in 2007 from an infection that was not related to the experiment.

Braingate evolved into an academic consortium directed by Hochberg. And in June 2025, a team at the University of California, Davis reported That a Braingate 2 BCI allowed to speak via a computer.

“I am. Good,” says the synthesized voice in a video that accompanies the study. The speech is somewhat stopped, one word pronounced for a while. But the voice sounds human – it is built from the old audio of the man who spoke.

Experiments such as showing how computer interfaces have improved, says Hochberg.

Instead of monitoring a few doornas, they can listen to thousands. Instead of sending information via wires, they use wireless protocols. And instead of interfacing with a wall of computers, the signals can go to a single laptop or tablet.

Another big change is that scientists continue to find ways to decode brain activity “more accurate, more consistent and more reliable,” says Hochberg.

In recent years, this meant the use of artificial intelligence to recognize the neural activity patterns that reveal the intention of a person to speak or collect a beam of chocolate.

The field has also become specialized, says Hochberg, with some groups aimed at decoding speech, while others work on improving control over robot leds.

There are even groups “aimed at returning information in the brain,” says Hochberg, who can add a sense of touch to a robot arm or hand.

Fingers that feel

The University of Pittsburgh is one of the leaders in giving sensory feedback through an interface of the brain computer.

“You can’t have a fine and dextred motor control with visual feedback alone,” says Jennifer CollingerA professor at the University of Pittsburgh. You need that feeling of touch to be able to respond in a natural way. “

With touchfeedback, the user can see when an artificial finger makes contact with an object or when an artificial hand holds a cup tight enough to prevent it from falling.

So Collinger and her colleagues have worked with BlackRock Neurotech, whose brain interface technology has been used experimental in dozens of people.

One of those people is Nathan CopelandIt was paralyzed in a car accident. In 2016, Copeland used a robot -like arm famous to bump fists with President Barack Obama.

In 2021, Copeland was part of a study that showed how a sense of touch improved his ability to grab and manipulate objects with his prosthetic hand.

“With sensation I could feel that the hand had made contact,” said Copeland in an interview in 2021 with NPR. “I could also see if I had a strong grip on it or not.”

But advanced functions such as sensory feedback do not appear in the first implanted devices on the market, says Collinger. Instead, they probably offer control over a computer cursor, just like Braingate did more than 20 years ago in those lab experiments.

“There has been enough consistent success that companies now say:” Okay, we can offer a device of the first generation to people who will offer them some kind of benefits, “says Collinger.

One of those companies is a precision -neuroscience, which was through co -foundation Ben RapoportA neurosurgeon and engineer who had previously helped starting Neuralink.

The other co-founder and CEO of Precision, Michael Mager, says that the short-term objective of the company is a wireless device with which a person with paralysis can operate a smartphone or computer.

“We are thinking of access to news and entertainment, we think of productivity software such as Microsoft Office, Word, PowerPoint, Excel,” says Mager. “If you can exploit those programs, as well as someone who is able to improve the quality of life and it may also be people to work again.”

The device from Precision differs from Neuralink’s because it does not place its electrodes in the brain.

“We have a very, very thin film that is designed to sit on the surface of the brain without penetrating or damaging the brain,” says Uiner.

That makes the implant safer and less invasive, says Mager, which can make it easier to get approval from the FDA.

Synchron avoids the skull completely. The electrodes are supplied by blood vessels using technology designed to place stents in blocked arteries.

All these devices face a number of common challenges, says Mager.

“We sampling thousands of electrodes, thousands of times per second, and the amount of data that comes from these systems is simply huge,” he says.

It is far too much data to send via existing wireless links. Companies therefore work on ways to reduce or compress the data.

Another obstacle is the costs to perform the type of clinical tests that the FDA requires. That will probably be hundreds of millions of dollars, says Mager.

Nevertheless, Means thinks that his company and various others, including Neuralink, have the resources and expertise to turn the brain interface concept into a tradable product.

That will take another 20 years, he says. Maybe two or three.