Noland Arbaugh is the first person to have a chip implanted in his brain through Neuralink, the company owned by Elon Musk. 30-year-old Arbaugh, who was paralyzed from the neck down as a result of a spinal cord injury while swimming in a lake in 2016, explained in an interview how the chip implanted in his brain affected his life.
How does Arbaugh’s Neuralink brain chip work?
In 2016, the year of Noland Arbaugh’s accident, Elon Musk co-founded Neuralink. In January, Arbaugh became the first person to receive the device called Telepathy. Known as a brain-computer interface, or BCI, this system decodes the brain’s intended movement signals and converts them into computer commands. So Arbaugh only needs to think about it to move the cursor on his computer.
Before the chip was implanted in his brain, the young man, whose movements were quite limited, was able to use his iPad with a stylus held in his mouth. Now, thanks to the chip in his brain, he can have full control of a computer just by thinking. He can now play games and surf the internet without moving at all.
He can do multiple actions at the same time
Announcing that he was selected on the first day he applied for the chip, Arbaugh stated that he underwent many different health screenings over the course of a month. Stating that he does not need extreme concentration to use the device, Arbaugh explained that it is now very easy to multitask with his brain:
“When I’m in sessions or playing games, I’m constantly multitasking. I can open an audiobook or something to watch and play a game at the same time, and it takes very little brain power to do it all.”
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Explaining that the only device he can control for now is a Macbook thanks to the chip in his brain, Arbaugh also announced that they will soon switch to a phone. Neuralink recently published a blog post about Arbaugh’s first 100 days with the device.
The post revealed a striking fact. It was learned that some of the implant’s threads, dotted with electrodes that read neural activity, were pulled from his brain. Speaking about this situation, Arbaugh stated that he first realized that something was wrong when he lost cursor control.
Arbaugh, who said he never thought such a problem would happen to him, stated that with a small change in software, he regained cursor control within two weeks. The young man, who said that he was initially afraid that the chip would stop working completely, stated that he no longer had any worries about this issue.
Stating that his life has completely changed after the implant, Arbaugh explained that he now feels more independent and less of a burden to the people around him. He underlined that what most paralyzed people want is to gain independence as well as complete recovery.
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Noland Arbaugh explained that the first thing he wants to do with the chip in his brain that he cannot do now is a robot he can control:
“I mentioned this at [Neuralink’s] public meeting and I think it would be really cool if I had a [Tesla] Optimus robot that I could control that would do everything for me and be my caregiver. That would eliminate probably 90 percent of the things that I need other people to do.
And it could also connect to other things. For example, I could connect to a car; a Tesla would be pretty cool because they drive themselves. I just need to find a way to get in and set an address. If I could do all this on my own, it would change everything.”
Arbaugh, who is known to have set a human record for cursor control with BCI, also explained why he hasn’t met other users like himself who have been implanted with brain chips by teasing them:
