By now, you should have heard of Elon Musk’s ultra-secretive Neuralink venture, which aims to implant devices into people’s brains so they can become JC Denton or Adam Jensen from Deus Ex. The idea sounds scary, not to mention nigh-on impossible, but Musk says that he’s going to show off a “working” prototype this Friday.
The demonstration will include an appearance by Neuralink’s special robot, which is responsible for installing the device into the brain by threading it like a sewing machine (again, scary-sounding stuff here). Musk claims that the process could be as simple as LASIK surgery in a few years.
“We have built arrays of small and flexible electrode ‘threads,’ with as many as 3,072 electrodes per array distributed across 96 threads,” Neuralink wrote in its initial paper. “We have also built a neurosurgical robot capable of inserting six threads (192 electrodes) per minute. Each thread can be individually inserted into the brain with micron precision for avoidance of surface vasculature and targeting specific brain regions.”
Live webcast of working @Neuralink device
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 26, 2020
Friday 3pm Pacific https://t.co/PouLbrGzFU
Yes, will show V2. Still far from LASIK, but could get pretty close in a few years.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 26, 2020
If all goes according to plan, Neuralink will hopefully succeed in treating serious brain-related diseases. We’ve even heard that the device can be used to stream music or other forms of media directly into the brain. But imagine what happens if there’s a bug, security vulnerability, or bad patch…