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The first Neuralink implant in a human malfunctioned after several threads recording neural activity retracted from the brain, the Elon Musk-owned startup revealed Wednesday.

The threads retracted in the weeks following the surgery in late January that placed the Neuralink hardware in 29-year-old Noland Arbaugh’s brain, the company said in a blog post.

This reduced the number of effective electrodes and the ability of Arbaugh, a quadriplegic, to control a computer cursor with his brain.

“In response to this change, we modified the recording algorithm to be more sensitive to neural population signals, improved the techniques to translate these signals into cursor movements, and enhanced the user interface,” Neuralink said in the blog post.

The company said the adjustments resulted in a “rapid and sustained improvement” in bits-per-second, a measure of speed and accuracy of cursor control, surpassing Arbaugh’s initial performance.

While the problem doesn’t appear to pose a risk to Arbaugh’s safety, Neuralink reportedly floated the idea of removing his implant, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The company has also told the Food and Drug Administration that it believes it has a solution for the issue that occurred with Arbaugh’s implant, the Journal reported.

The implant was placed just more than 100 days ago. In the blog post, the company touted Arbaugh’s ability to play online computer games, browse the internet, livestream and use other applications “all by controlling a cursor with his mind.”

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[-] TimeSquirrel@kbin.social 15 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Everything's "techbros living in a sci-fi novel", until one day it isn't.

I'm only 42 and I have seen very incredible advancements made in my lifetime that I never thought would be reality as a child. Handheld mobile communications devices that allow you to talk and share media instantly with anyone on the planet, for instance. That's some literal Star Trek shit. Or the fact we now have the equivalent computing power of all the world's supercomputers in the 80s put together on our desks. Or RNA vaccines, instead of using dead or dying viruses, we can now reprogram the body to make whatever antibodies it needs.

[-] Lemmeenym@lemm.ee 3 points 6 months ago

The USB-C set a new benchmark for the popular Apollo 11 comparison. With the release of the USB-C, your phone's charger now is about 563x faster, can store about 75% more commands, and has about 2x the RAM vs the Apollo 11.

https://www.theverge.com/tldr/2020/2/11/21133119/usb-c-anker-charger-apollo-11-moon-landing-guidance-computer-more-powerful

this post was submitted on 10 May 2024
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