A matchstick-sized device (right) called a stentrode is implanted in a blood vessel that sits over the brain.
UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE
Mind Meld! Top Brain-Controlled Techs
View Caption + #1: If we can think it, we can control it.
Ars Electronica
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A mind-controlled robotic arm helped this patient drink a beverage without any help from doctors or nurses.
Nature video screen grab
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The MindWalker exoskeleton debuted in Belgium and is currently in clinical trials.
Helen Thomson, New Scientist video
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Several teams are advancing machines to decode brain signals and translate them into speech or text
Vernon Doucette and Kalman Zabarsky
View Caption + #5: Brian implants could allow people to move paralyzed limbs.
Northwestern University
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Mind-control technology was used to manipulate this humanoid PR2 robot named Hobbes.
Youtube Screen Grab
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A noninvasive method allows people to fly this remote-controlled helicopter by squeeze a hand into a fist.
University of Minnesota
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The BrainDriver system allows a person to steer a car using his own brainwaves.
Autonomous Labs
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The Unlock Project is being developed so that a locked-in person can control everything in his home with his mind.
The Unlock Project
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Scientists have wired together the brains of two rats, allowing them transmit information between each other and cooperate.
Katie Zhuang, Laboratory of Dr. Miguel Nicolelis, Duke University
Related Links
Tonight President Obama will continue his weeklong stint as the guest presenter on the Science Channel. On Science Presents DNews(9pmET/PT), the POTUS will talk about new research from Australian scientists who have created a "bionic spinal cord" that could give paralyzed people the hope of walking again through the power of thought.
The system relies on a device the size of a paperclip implanted in a blood vessel next to the brain. For those without a TV, you can watch Obama talk about this technology and other important research on DNews' YouTubechannel as well as the Science Channel's website. Follow #ObamaOnDNews on Twitter to let us know what you think!
An experimental treatment uses electricity to help people suffering from paralysis stand up and even walk! Could this technique provide a cure for some victims? Tara explains how this therapy works.
The stent-based electrode would record the brain activity needed for movement and this would be translated into commands to control wheelchairs, exoskeletons, prosthetic limbs or computers.
"We have been able to create the world's only minimally invasive device that is implanted into a blood vessel in the brain via a simple day procedure, avoiding the need for high risk open brain surgery," researcher Thomas Oxley said.
Oxley, a neurologist at The Royal Melbourne Hospital and research fellow at The Florey Institute of Neurosciences and the University of Melbourne, described the device, or stentrode, as revolutionary.
"Our vision, through this device, is to return function and mobility to patients with complete paralysis by recording brain activity and converting the acquired signals into electrical commands, which in turn would lead to movement of the limbs through a mobility assist device like an exoskeleton," he said in a statement.
"In essence this a bionic spinal cord."
The research, which will see the first in-human trial at The Royal Melbourne Hospital in 2017, was published Tuesday in Nature Biotechnology. It shows the device could record high-quality signals emitted from the brain's motor cortex, without the need for open brain surgery, based on research using sheep.
2016 Cybathlon Competition Designed for Parathletes
The Cybathlon is a championship for racing pilots with disabilities, who are using advanced assistive devices including robotic technologies.
Image courtesy D’Arc. Studio Associates Architects
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Pilots with complete thoracic or lumbar Spinal Cord Injuries (SCI) will be equipped with actuated exoskeletal devices, which will enable them to walk along a particular race cours
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots with transfemoral amputation will be equipped with actuated exoprosthetic devices and will have to successfully complete a race course as quickly as possible.
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots will be equipped with brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) that will enable them to control an avatar in a racing game played on computers.
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots with complete Spinal Cord Injuries will be equipped with Functional Electrical Stimulation devices, which will enable them to perform a pedaling movement on a cycling device that drives them on a circular course.
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots with forearm or upper arm amputations will be equipped with actuated exoprosthetic devices and will have to successfully complete two hand-arm task courses as quickly as possible.
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots with complete thoracic or lumbar Spinal Cord Injuries (SCI) will be equipped with actuated exoskeletal devices, which will enable them to walk along a particular race cours
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
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Pilots with different disability levels (e.g. quadriplegics, paraplegics, amputees) will be equipped with power wheelchairs, which will enable them to steer along a particular race course.
ETH Zurch and NCCR Robotics
Brain-machine interface is one of the main areas of research in paralysis treatment.
In 2014, scientists in the United States said they had demonstrated how a monkey could use only its thoughts, transferred by electrodes via a computer, to manipulate the arm of a fully-sedated fellow primate.
Two years earlier, a collaboration between researchers in the United States and the German Aerospace Centre enabled a paralyzed woman to lift a drink to her lips with a thought-controlled robotic arm.
Speaking to AFP, Oxley said that all the other brain-machine interface technologies had involved inserting an electrode directly into the brain.
He said the aim was for the new device to work much like a cardiac pacemaker, which is typically inserted without open-heart surgery. "The cardiac pacemaker is essentially the classic bionic device -- it goes inside a vein, it sits next to the heart and it works for a lifetime," Oxley said.
"And we are essentially trying to do the exact same thing for the brain. Go up a vein, leave it there, and have a lifetime of recordings coming out of it."
It is hoped that the research, which involved 39 scientists from the Royal Melbourne Hospital, the University of Melbourne and the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, could also be used to treat epilepsy, depression and Parkinsons.