The Human Trials of Neuralink: Merging of Humans and A.I.

Friday - November 10 2023, 04:54 UTC - 1 year ago

After receiving approval from the FDA, thousands of prospective patients have expressed interest in being guinea pigs for Neuralink's clinical trial of their implantable, wireless brain-computer interface (BCI). The safety of their chip and robotic surgical procedure is a major concern, and many have raised objections over their monkey trials. Elon Musk envisions a future of humans merging with artificial intelligence and has shown a "maniacal" sense of urgency. Recruiting for the human trials began in September and the company aims to perform 11 surgeries in 2024 and increase this to 22,204 by 2030.

After receiving approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to conduct human trials, thousands of prospective patients have shown interest in being guinea pigs for Neuralink, wrote Ashlee Vance for Bloomberg. Vance also wrote a biography on Elon Musk in 2015.

The FDA had initially rejected the company’s request to run human trials back in 2022, citing safety concerns.

The clinical trial involves implanting electrodes and super thin wires into a patient's brain and requires that a part of the skull be removed to insert a computer the size of a quarter. This implant aims to read and analyze the person's brain activity and transmit this information wirelessly to a nearby device like a laptop or tablet.

After conducting similar trials on pigs, sheep, and monkeys, the company wants to check if their implant and surgical robot are safe to use on humans. Safety is a big factor in such medical tech, especially when a part of the brain is being popped open to implant a chip inside. And Neuralink hasn’t always received full marks for its procedures.

Concerns raised over monkey trials .

Interesting Engineering reported in September that, as per the veterinary records accessed by PCRM and Wired, the rhesus macaque monkeys used for Neuralink experiments were euthanized after suffering complications like "bloody diarrhea, partial paralysis, and cerebral edema." .

In one of the cases, one female monkey would pull and pluck at her implant until it bled and held hands with her cagemate. She had to be later euthanized.

Testing of new medical treatments and devices on animals has long been part of science to see if they are effective and safe for human use. It can be a gruesome process. In human trials, there’s no room for error.

"Maniacal" sense of urgency .

While Neuralink won’t be the first company to have developed brain implants that allow basic tasks to be performed with thoughts, its ambitions are grander. Elon Musk envisions a future where humans merge with artificial intelligence, downloading knowledge directly into their brains and communicating thoughts to other brains.

"We need to get there before the AI takes over. We want to get there with a maniacal sense of urgency. Maniacal," said Musk during a company meeting once, recalls Vance.

In the month of September, Neuralink started recruiting for their first-in-human clinical trial for the brain chip called fully-implantable, wireless brain-computer interface (BCI). A patient may apply to participate in the study if they have limited or no ability to use both hands due to cervical spinal cord injury or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). They also want to see if their brain chip works for people with paralysis. This BCI helps them control things using their thoughts.

Neuralink says it plans to perform 11 surgeries in 2024, 27 in 2025, and 79 in 2026. Then things really ramp up, going from 499 surgeries in 2027 to 22,204 by 2030, according to documents provided to investors, according to the Bloomberg report.