DARPA is funding brain computer interfaces - Breakthrough by 2021 !!

Research Investment to connect Brain and Computer

Mr. Elon Musk said on facebook, nowadays research teams here and there trying to connect the human brain and the computer. If such technology is realized, it is said that it will eventually become possible to read others 'thoughts without words and to make your own artificial intelligence' s abilities. And the other day, the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced that it will invest 65 million dollars to develop nerve implants that connect brain and computer for the treatment of sensory disorders such as blindness.

When you look at the research team that was the subject of this investment plan " Neural Engineering System Design (NESD) program", what kind of thing is DARPA trying to realize? You can grasp roughly. In this plan, we are funding six research teams, of which two are aiming to restore vision using LEDs. Another team was trying to decipher the processing of the conversation in the brain using a sensor as small as a grain of grain, and another team detected nerve activity with a holographic microscope and eventually lost It aims to be an alternative to a vision and to be an interface to move prosthetic limbs.

The planning period is 4 years, the goal is to create a prototype that actually moves, allowing data to be exchanged between the brain and the computer. However, even if such a prototype is completed, it will take a long time before it can be used for commercial or clinical use.

"It will take a long time to make new eyes by the medical science and to be able to repair the damaged spinal cord but by connecting the brain and the computer it is possible to use the power of digital devices, It will be possible to recover some functions. "Matthew Angle of Paradromics, one of the companies that received a grant from DARPA, said like this. The company develops a method to stimulate and record neuron activity by embedding an ultrafine wire-like electrode in the brain. Their goal is to develop a device that enables people to talk again who can not speak again, and they are hoping to begin clinical trials by 2021.

"Initially team focused on what we call" connectivity disorders ", which means diseases and injuries that destroy or severely injure the connection with the outside world by sensory / exercise." Angle stated "From now on, I imagine that " neural prostheses "will also be available for treatment of certain nerve diseases ."

This is not the first time for DARPA to develop brain computer interface development. DARPA has made a great deal of investment in brain computer interface technology, such as treatment of mental illness and recovery of soldier's memory lost in a war. But these projects are ongoing, that is, they have not been completed yet.

However, the aim of this NESD aims, the technology itself developed it is also a little different from what we have done so far. What NESD is aiming for is not a method that affects only a specific part of the brain for specific effects like PTSD treatment, for example. They are trying to develop a technology that (converts brain signals to 0 and 1 that can be understood by the machine and can exchange with more than 1 million of the 86 billion neurons in the brain.)

If such technology can be really done, not only can it be used for a variety of treatments but also understanding about the ability such as vision, hearing, and conversation can be deeply deepened, so telepathy may be possible as much as possible.

For example, a research team led by Ehud Isacoff of the University of California, Berkeley plans to develop a holographic microscope that detects and transforms the activities of up to 1 million neurons in the cerebral cortex using the light field. This team is trying to convey a patterned prediction model of the response to the visual and tactile stimuli of the brain by the brain implants to the person who lost vision or tactility. By doing so, we want to convey the things visible to the person who lost vision to the person who lost the sense of touch.

"The technical goal is to" read "the activity of one million individual neurons and" write back "the activity pattern that stimulates spontaneous brain activity against that, making such a brain modem"

Isacoff says that the optical imaging they are using may be more effective than the method of stimulating the brain with the electrodes of the implant. That is because it sees the specific part of the brain very accurately. Isacoff wants to make devices that can be used for animals within 4 years.

"We want to make it possible to decipher neural codes of sensory perception on this device, " Isacoff said. "If successful, you should be able to generate an appropriate pattern reflecting what is going on in the outside world, so that you can see invisible people, and by restoring tactile feedback to those who use artificial hands, You will be able to more easily manipulate the prosthetic hands. "

Ken Shepard's team at Columbia University, meanwhile, is also trying to create a device to restore vision for blind people. They are considering putting flexible circuits on top of the brain and communicating between them and the transceiver you put on your head.

Shepard said "The goal of this research is to broaden the potential of the brain machine interface, I would like to provide a means to interact with the brain's circuit on a scale that we have never achieved before."

There are many tasks. How to keep such devices operating in the body, how to process the data, how to map signals emitted by the brain, how to understand how to convey to the complex circuits of the brain, and so on.

The goal of DARPA is that they all teams produce practical and commercially applicable application technology .

Angle of Paradromics warned that such technology would not allow anyone to read each other's mind. He believes that it will remain unknown to us how to use these technologies for people with physical and mental illnesses in the next 20 years. As far as the closer future is concerned , emphasis will be placed on overcoming obstacles caused by the fact that the brain can not communicate with the body, such as blindness and crime.

"Medical applications are so numerous that many companies can tack over decades," Angle said. "We see the invisible people visible and the technical pathways for them to be able to walk again can be seen in a trustworthy manner.This has been true since the history of human beings ambitious, but I think that the point that evolves at a stretch will come in the next 10 years. "

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