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After 40 Years As a Double Amputee, Man Gains Two Bionic Arms
MojoKid writes Les Baugh, a Colorado man who lost both arms in an electrical accident 40 years ago, is looking forward to being able to insert change into a soda machine and retrieving the beverage himself. But thanks to the wonders of science and technology — and Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) — he'll regain some of those functions while making history as the first bilateral shoulder-level amputee to wear and simultaneously control two Modular Prosthetic Limbs (MPLs). "It's a relatively new surgical procedure that reassigns nerves that once controlled the arm and the hand," explained Johns Hopkins Trauma Surgeon Albert Chi, M.D. "By reassigning existing nerves, we can make it possible for people who have had upper-arm amputations to control their prosthetic devices by merely thinking about the action they want to perform."
This guy!
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
"hey buddy, now that you have two arms and hands again, what are you going to do?"
Masterbate!
It looked as though those metal braces were suspending the arms several inches further from his body than necessary. I wonder if I'm seeing it wrong, or if they were perhaps trying to prevent him accidentally ripping out his abdomen with the elbows while learning.
I don't know about power though - granted it probably wouldn't run all that long off a laptop battery, but a human arm doesn't normally exert all that much power, and human muscle is *far* less efficient (18%-26%) than modern electric motors. I mean a soda-sized Li-ion battery can power an electric bicycle for an hour or so, and I imagine having a six-pack strapped to your back would be a small price to pay for a half-day of having arms.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Unfortunately, the arms cost $6 Million, and everything he does with them is in slow motion, accompanied by a reverb sound effect.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Nothing like a reminder that you live in the future.
I know we've been talking about biomechatronics for decades, but Moore's Law and developments in nanomaterials are making things possible that were the stuff of science fiction just a few years ago. Simply put, we're starting to build amazingly large numbers of amazingly complex structures at amazingly small scales out of amazing materials, amazingly cheap.
Mind you, that's not new either; biology has been doing that for eons. Yet being able to manufacture it, to mass-produce biological or biocompatible materials like BCIs and prosthetic organs, is a remarkable and wholly new development. I fully expect the next half century will see a medical revolution that rivals the computer revolution of the last.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
Does he understand that once he learns to control it we're going to expect him to fight crime with it? He's aware of that right?
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
He cut twice and both arms were still too short!
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
I can comment with some authority on this (this is my cousin in the article!)
Yes, an electrical accident can make you lose both arms and stop your heart, however the fall that occurred afterwards (at least according to the doctor) restarted his heart. I saw the sun glasses he was wearing that changed color based on sunlight (which were permanently stuck in a darkened state) so the whole situation and environment around this was probably a once in a lifetime situation.