Slashdot Mirror
Paralyzed Woman Uses Mind-Controlled Robot Arm
MrSeb writes "Using BrainGate, the world's most advanced brain-computer interface, a woman with quadriplegia has used a mind-controlled robot arm to serve herself coffee — an act she hasn't been able to perform for 15 years. BrainGate, which is being developed by a team of American neuroscientists from Brown and Stanford universities, and is currently undergoing clinical trial, requires a computer chip to be implanted in the motor cortex of the patient, which it then transmits to a computer for processing. Like all brain-computer interfaces, the user must train the software — but once this is done, you simply think of a movement, and the software moves the robot accordingly. Moving forward, the researchers would like to miniaturize the system and make it wireless — at the moment, BrainGate users have a box attached to their head, and they're tethered to a computer — which is OK for robot arm use at home, but obviously doesn't grant much mobility. The work was partly funded by DARPA, with the hope of creating more advanced prosthetics for wounded war veterans." This comes on the heels of a 71-year-old man regaining motor function in his fingers after doctors rewired his nerves to bypass the damaged ones.
This will end with a mind controlling robot army.
"The work was partly funded by DARPA, with the hope of creating more advanced prosthetics for wounded war veterans."
Yeah, sure, that's what it's for, Mr. Sarin.
"Moving forward, the researchers would like to miniaturize the system and make it wireless"
And that is the purpose of Braingate2: http://www.braingate2.org/
I doubt she has any feeling in her cooch, jackass.
Maybe the 80s cyberpunk authors weren't so off the mark, between the economic recession (depression?) and this kind of medical/cybernetic development...
20+ years ago, I saw an episode of a show "Beyond 2000". They had someone hooked up to electrodes of some sort, there was nothing implanted. She was controlling an avatar, in first person, in a 3D environment with her thoughts. I always thought if we could do that 20 years ago why, has it taken so long to see anything more. Even now, this really isn't any more impressive. If we could even control a mouse pointer and "click" with our mind it could be very useful. It wouldn't be much more to then be able to text with our minds, which then opens up a form of telepathy.
I just wonder why this tech seems to have been stuck in its tracks for so long.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Just sayin'....
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
35 year old work, rehashed because "it's got a computer!!!" The technology has never worked well because electrodes, whether the myocardial skin electrodes or the implanted ones of this new technology, wind up getting a tremendous amount of electrical noise from the area of the elctrode, and the noise is from similar signal electrode signals. To sort out the valid signals from all the noise takes about half a second: digital sampling does not help this, and is in fact counterproductive because it adds its own noise and makes the system take much more power.
You can write a lot more papers and get more people excited by your "computer control", a low pass filter with an adjustable gain does a much better job with much less power consumption and much less error, and this has been true since the invention of the Boston Arm. Now, if they'd invented a new electrode technology, I'd be much more excited. But this is a rehash of decades, even centuries old work (Look up Voltaire hearing sounds from putting an electrode in his mouth and one in his ear: the electrodes really haven't gotten much better.)
15 years without a coffee? She's going to be bouncing off the walls after that cup!
Star Wars, but I guess baby steps are better than no steps.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
During the early tests of this device one technician was knocked unconscious after repeatedly urging her to shout "Hand, pick up the ball!"
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
What year is it now? 2012? Hmm...this looks promising, but not quite what I want yet. Wake me up when I can have Doc Ock-like arms attached to me that will function in the obvious intended way (like extra natural arms).
*back into cryogenic stasis*
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
As it says in the article, it's totally worth seeing the look on her face.
[End Of Line]
The work was partly funded by DARPA, with the hope of creating more advanced prosthetics for wounded war veterans
They want to create cyborg soldiers
...right as the coffee hits her tongue she get the most uncontrollable smile. Brought a teary smile to my face.
I would control the arm to pick up a gun and shoot myself!
I was serving myself free-trade coffee with a fixed-gear mind-controlled robotic arm BEFORE it was cool.
We all know what this research means... we are one step closer to creating Inspector Gadget.
Maybe she likes it in the mouth but even if not would she rather have that cup of coffee or a fucking orgasm in the morning?
She's a woman, so judging by my experience with them, she'd probably rather have the coffee. The orgasm is usually something she'll ask for to inconvenience you after a full day of inconveniencing you when the last thing you want to do is put in more effort on her.
Fellow card-carrying member of the he-man-woman-haters club - welcome to slashdot - you are amongst friends.
The captcha once again shows its got some tuning to do: vibrate - that should be, vibrator.
The arm itself was developed by the robotics and mechatronics department of German Aerospace Center (DLR) as explained by this article. The extremtech article fails to mention that.
I for one welcome our new robot overlords.
We are the Borg...we are really thirsty ...we will drink your coffee ...resistance is futile.
Great warrior...hrmph! Wars not make one great.
"you simply think of a movement, and the software moves the robot accordingly"
and:
"Men don't really think about sex 'every seven seconds' - just 19 times a day
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2067542/Men-dont-think-sex-seven-seconds-rest-easy--idea-myth-researchers-found.html#ixzz1vDRlvaHi"
Now when she spills scalding hot coffee on herself, she can sue someone else.