Neuralink, a company working to develop computer interfaces that can be implanted in human brains, placed its first device on a patient on Sunday, its founder Elon Musk said.
Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, said Monday that the company's first product was called Telepathy and would allow a human being to control a phone or computer “simply by thinking.”
“The initial users will be those who have lost the use of their limbs,” Musk said. wrote in a series of posts on X, his social media platform. “Imagine if Stephen Hawking could communicate faster than a typist or an auctioneer.”
Musk and Neuralink did not provide further details about who received the implant or whether it was working. Musk did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
In November 2022, Musk predicted that the company would begin human testing within six months. At the time, Neuralink demonstrated a product in a video that purportedly showed two monkeys moving computer cursors with their brains, a feat that had been shown to be possible in humans more than 15 years earlier.
While Musk is typically optimistic about predictions for his companies, some of which have yet to come true, Neuralink received approval from the Food and Drug Administration to begin human trials last May.
The company's website currently says its “first clinical trial is open to recruitment” for people with limited or no use of both hands due to a cervical spinal cord injury or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a neurological disorder that affects the nerve cells.
“This study involves placing a small, aesthetically invisible implant in a part of the brain that plans movements,” Neuralink's website reads. “The device is designed to interpret a person's neural activity so that they can operate a computer or smartphone simply with the intention of moving – no cables or physical movement are required.”
At Neuralink's presentation in late 2022, Musk said the company's devices would eventually allow blind people to see or give someone with a severed spinal cord “full-body functionality.” His claims at the time sparked skepticism from experts who argued that science had yet to advance that far.
