Jonathan Raa | Nurfoto | fake images
Elon Musk's neurotech startup Neuralink implanted its device in a human for the first time on Sunday, and the patient is “recovering well,” the billionaire said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Monday.
The company is developing a brain implant that aims to help severely paralyzed patients control external technologies using only neural signals. Neuralink began recruiting patients for its first-in-human clinical trial in the fall after receiving approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to conduct the study in May, according to a blog post.
Musk said Monday that Neuralink's first product is called Telepathy, according to an X post.
If the technology works correctly, patients with serious degenerative diseases such as ALS could one day use the implant to communicate or access social networks by moving cursors and writing with their minds.
“Imagine if Stephen Hawking could communicate faster than a typist or an auctioneer,” Musk wrote. “That's the goal.”
The human clinical trial marks just one step on Neuralink's path to commercialization. Medical device companies must go through several rounds of intense data collection and safety testing before gaining final approval from the FDA.
Neuralink did not disclose how many human patients will participate in its initial human trial. The company did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment on the recent proceeding.
As part of the emerging brain-computer interface, or BCI, industry, Neuralink is perhaps the best-known company in space thanks to the high profile of Musk, who is also the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. A BCI is a system that deciphers brain signals and translates them into commands for external technologies, and several companies such as Synchron, Precision Neuroscience, Paradromics, and Blackrock Neurotech have also created systems with these capabilities.
Paradromics aims to launch its first trial in human patients in the first half of this year. Precision Neuroscience conducted its first human clinical study last year. A patient who received BCI from Synchron used it to post from CEO Tom Oxley's Twitter account in 2021.
It is not clear which company will be the first to market.
