Earlier this year, Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface startup Neuralink implanted a brain chip, around the size of a quarter, into a human patient for the first time. The company has since completed a second human brain implant and plans to perform eight more such procedures on trial participants by the end of 2024, Musk said in a podcast interview with Lex Fridman that aired on Aug. 2.
“We’re hoping to do ten by the end of this year,” Musk told Fridman. “It’s obviously going to get better with each one,” he added. Neuralink’s primary products are its N1 brain-computer interface (BCI) and a robot surgeon designed to insert the chip. The implants offer independence to those with neurological damage by enabling them to control computer cursors with their thoughts and, therefore, connect to the digital world without moving. Each chip contains over 1,000 electrodes across 64 threads, transmitting neural signals once embedded into the brain’s motor cortex.
The first recipient of a Neuralink implant was Noland Arbaugh, a 30-year-old who was left paralyzed after suffering a spinal cord injury in 2016 and received the BCI in a procedure in January. The embedded chip has allowed Arbaugh, also interviewed by Fridman during the Aug. 2 episode, to play a host of video games by himself. “Just having the freedom to do things on my own, at any hour of the day or night, it means the world to me,” said Arbaugh.
Around a month after the procedure, however, Arbaugh began to lose some of the capabilities enabled by his Neuralink implant as many of its threads came loose from his brain. Neuralink subsequently restored the chip’s functionalities through software tweaks. Even with only 10 to 15 percent of his N1 electrodes working, Arbaugh has been able to beat his former world record for speed and accuracy in controlling a cursor with a BCI, said Musk.
Neuralink’s second patient, whose name and identity have not been made public, currently has around 400 electrodes functioning in their brain, Musk said. “I don’t want to jinx it, but it seems to have gone extremely well with the second implant. There’s a lot of signals, a lot of electrodes.” Neuralink received permission from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to conduct this second procedure in May. But the company didn’t reveal when the procedure was performed.
As Neuralink continues its clinical trials, it expects N1 to showcase “gigantic” improvements over the years, according to Musk, who noted that electrode numbers will increase and signal processing will improve. “We feel pretty confident that within the next year or two, someone with a Neuralink implant will be able to outperform a pro gamer because the reaction time will be faster,” he told Fridman.
Giving patients ‘superpowers’
Established by Musk in 2017, Neuralink’s primary goal for the time being is to aid paralyzed individuals. “The first order of business is solving fundamental neuron damage in the spinal cord, neck or in the brain itself,” said Musk. In addition to improving the communication of patients, the Neuralink founder said his startup might as well also alter their communication data rate to exceed that of the ordinary human. “While we’re in there, why not? Let’s give people superpowers,” he said.
The company’s ultimate long-term goal, however, is to “improve the A.I.-human symbiosis,” he told Fridman. Refining the bandwidth of communication for humans will be essential in a world dominated by A.I., where the technology “is simply going to get bored waiting for you to spit out a few words,” he said. But before Neuralink tackles those ambitious aspirations and embeds its chips for non-medical purposes, it needs to lessen N1’s current level of risk and see its brain chips used successfully by thousands of patients. “Perhaps at that point, you could consider saying, ‘Okay, let’s aim for augmentation,’” said Musk.
