Robot Controlled By Human Brain Cells

destinyland writes "There's a new experiment from the British researchers who created a robot controlled by cultured rat neurons. They're now using a line of human brain neurons to control robots. The neurons are placed onto a multi-electrode dish that registers the neurons' electric signals. 'Every time the robot nears an object, the electrodes generate signals to stimulate the brain. In response, the brain's output is used to drive the wheels of the robot left and right so that it avoids hitting objects. The robot has no additional control from a human or a computer — its sole means of control is from its own brain.'"

Comments

Re:bad summary?

[Rogerborg]

Aaaah... "Captain Cyborg"! I can't believe this chap (or robochap as he'd describe himself) is still getting funding for his joke research. I guess Reading University don't mind being laughed at, as long as they're being talked about.

"It's difficult to describe how frustrating it is in the field seeing this man being our spokesman," says Richard Reeve, of the AI department at Edinburgh.

Well, quite.

Warwick has his own reality TV show

[RandCraw]

In 1998, Kevin Warwick implants a trivial RF resonator in his arm (the sticky plastic strip that warns Walmart that someone is stealing a pair of socks). He contacts the press, calls himself a cyborg, and gets tenure at Reading U.

In 2001, he replaces his implant with an RFID tag, and calls the press again, and says, "Look at me, look at me! Now I'm an ACTIVE cyborg!" And he becomes a full professor at Reading U.

And now Warwick gets 300,000 neurons to produce a simple binary response (go straight vs turn). He calls the press again, and says, "Look at what I can do just by waving my arm".

Jackass. Worse, the media can't tell the difference between poseurs like him and real scientists like Sebastian Thrun or Rod Brooks.