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Better Brain Implants With Ultrathin Carbon Fiber Electrodes
An anonymous reader writes "A new neural interface delicate enough not to damage nerve tissue, but resilient enough to last decades has been made. Made from a single carbon fiber and coated with chemicals, the technology is believed to be fully resistant to proteins in the brain. From the article: 'The new microthread electrode, designed to pick up signals from a single neuron as it fires, is only about 7 micrometers in diameter. That is the thinnest yet developed, and about 100 times as thin as the conventional metal electrodes widely used to study animal brains.
“We wanted to see if we could radically change implant technology,” says Takashi Kozai, a researcher at the University of Pittsburgh and the lead author on the paper, published today in the journal Nature Materials. “We want to see an electrode that lasts 70 years.”'"
Somewhere in a hot tub, Paris Hilton is screaming: "They do brain implants, now? Oh my god, I want a set of those! Oh my– call my plastic surgeon and tell him I want those. Not too big. I just had my hair done."
Woot! A start to a scifi dream come true.
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