The ‘brainternt’ project: Scientists create wireless implants that could let users control computes and smart devices with their MINDS

• Most brain implants need wires to be connected to the brain and a power source
• New implants lay inside the tissue and communicate with a wireless device
• READ MORE:  Brain implant could allow you to use social media with your MIND

Humans could soon have ‘brainternet’ thanks to a wireless implant that will let people control computers and smart devices with their minds.

Scientists at Purdue University designed a device smaller than a dime that sensed and transmitted data to a pair of over-the-ear headphones.

Unlike current brain chips, Purdue’s implants do not need to connect to a computer or device to capture the user’s brain waves. 

The team foresees their innovation letting people connect to the internet, computers and other smart devices no matter where they are. 

While there have been many attempts to link brain signals with an external device, the latest research is the first to demonstrate high-bandwidth wireless communication between neural implants and wearable devices.

Scientists at Purdue University designed a tiny brain chip, smaller than a dime, which senses and transmits data to a wearable device shaped like headphones that act as the receiver

Jan Rabaey, at the University of California, Berkeley. Rabaey, who was not involved in the study, said: ‘It’s very attractive to have a device communicate from outside the skull to an implant.

‘It is an interesting new twist on a problem a lot of people have been tackling.’

To implant Purdue’s chips, doctors remove the skin over the skull, and a bilateral craniotomy is performed using a precision surgery dental drill. 

After the craniotomy, the midline skull is thinned down to improve contact with the implant, which is untethered to the brain like those made by Elon Musk’s Neuralink.

Neuralink uses electrodes to connect chips to the brain.

The human body, including the brain, can innately support internal communications based on the generation of tiny electrical signals, the high-speed nature of which establishes a ‘broadband’ channel spanning across the body. 

The system places various implants throughout the brain tissue that need less power yet provide high-bandwidth data communication because they form a unified network 

Purdue’s grain-sized implants can be placed on top of the tissue and patients wear a headphone-like device as the hub

So-called brain-computer interfaces are designed to enable high bandwidth interactions between these brain signals and computers. 

Shreyas Sen, the principal investigator for the study, told Tech Xplore: ‘Once our electric-field base was mature around the body, it became an obvious choice for us to conduct this investigation, as it is also applicable inside the brain for high bandwidth ultra-low power implant-to-computer communication.’

The team developed the system using a two-phase approach called biphasic quasistatic brain communication for wireless neural implants. 

READ MORE: Neuralink is recruiting participants to trial brain implants

Neuralink wants to treat conditions such as paralysis and blindness by linking brains to computers with the help of microchips. 

The term quasistatic signifies the signal that operates at a relatively low frequency.

Study leader Baibhab Chatterjee told TechXplore: ‘In this work, we demonstrate a technique called biphasic quasistatic brain communication (BP-QBC), which can reduce that power consumption by orders of magnitude (~41X reduction at 1 MHz), enabling the creation of an ultra-low-power yet broadband communication channel.

‘Furthermore, owing to a fully EQS signaling, our methods do not incur any transduction loss as compared to competing technologies such as ultrasound, optical and magneto-electric data transfer, thereby reducing the system-level losses, which is another unique advantage of this technology.’ 

 However, looking ahead, Rabaey does wonder how such devices will perform during in vivo studies, in which the electrical signal moves through the skull and various brain tissues, rather than the simplified saltwater model. 

‘More research and experiments will be needed to show this is really robust in a variety of circumstances,’ he said.

Sen acknowledged that there is at least another 10 years to go before products contain this kind of tech.

 But, Sen said, ‘the building blocks are coming together,’ and the ‘big thing’ demonstrated in the recent study is that the brain can get ‘its own broadband.’ 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source: Read Full Article