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posted by janrinok on Friday October 14 2016, @08:32PM   Printer-friendly
from the touchy-feely dept.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2016/10/13/in-a-medical-first-brain-implant-allows-paralyzed-man-to-feel-again/

For the first time, scientists have helped a paralyzed man experience the sense of touch in his mind-controlled robotic arm. For the cutting-edge experiment, a collaboration between the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, electrodes smaller than a grain of sand were implanted in the sensory cortex of the man's brain. The electrodes received signals from a robot arm. When a researcher pressed the fingers of the prosthesis, the man felt the pressure in the fingers of his paralyzed right hand, effectively bypassing his damaged spinal cord The results of the experiment, which have been repeated over several months with 30-year-old Nathan Copeland, offer a breakthrough in the restoration of a critical function in people with paralyzed limbs: the ability not just to move those limbs, but to feel them.

[...] To test whether the new chips could allow him to experience touch, he was blindfolded so that he couldn't see what the researcher was doing. One by one, the researcher touched each of the fingers on the robot's right hand, and each time Copeland correctly identified the location of the touch. "I can feel just about every finger," Copeland said Wednesday. "Sometimes it feels electrical, and sometimes it's pressure, but for the most part, I can tell most of the fingers with definite precision. It feels like my fingers are getting touched or pushed."

Also at The Guardian, NPR, PBS, Nature, and the University of Pittsburgh.

Intracortical microstimulation of human somatosensory cortex (DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.aaf8083) (DX)


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  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 14 2016, @09:55PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 14 2016, @09:55PM (#414457)

    I could log in via my university proxy to read this paper, but didn't bother. It is becoming common enough to not require that step that I now view it as a major annoyance when it is necessary, I will only bother if it sounds really interesting/relevant to me. Do you want us to read about your research or not, Flesher et al?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 14 2016, @10:10PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 14 2016, @10:10PM (#414461)

    Well that all depends. Are you providing grant money? If not, fuck off. We academics only care about the funding.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by jcross on Friday October 14 2016, @10:44PM

      by jcross (4009) on Friday October 14 2016, @10:44PM (#414466)

      As a US taxpayer I probably am.

  • (Score: 4, Funny) by frojack on Friday October 14 2016, @11:02PM

    by frojack (1554) on Friday October 14 2016, @11:02PM (#414469) Journal

    Do you want us to read about your research or not, Flesher et al?

    I'm guessing NOT.

    I would bet the draw to keeping esoteric or highly technical work behind paywalls is precisely not having to deal with marginally interested and mostly unqualified unsolicited correspondents.

    And if the work involves human implants and anything sounding vaguely borg-esq, not having to deal with religious whackjobs probably is a bonus.

    --
    No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.