Man walks again after having brain signals 'routed' to legs

A 26-year-old paraplegic man walked again after spending 5 years paralyzed from the waist down due to an injury to his backbone. The experiment, conducted by the University of California (Irvine, USA), was able to route the youngster's brain signals to the knees that, when identifying stimuli, returned to function.

A 3.5 meter course was covered by the patient without the aid of an exoskeleton or any robotic prosthesis. For the feat to be accomplished, the man had to wear a cap equipped with dedicated brainwave electrodes. The commands, after sent to a computer via wireless technology, were processed and then sent to a control positioned on the boy's belt, which resulted in the activation of the nerves responsible for performing the movements.

Only specific stimuli can be processed by the system (such as walking or standing, for example). In any case, the experiment was a success and proved the possibility of routing brain signals to “compensate” for damaged neurological areas. And a 20-week training had to be done during the development of the new technique: In addition to muscle strengthening, the patient's brain had to be conditioned to send “clear signals” to the equipment.

It turns out that, according to the researchers, the computer that interprets the commands can “get confused” if “unobtrusive” stimuli are picked up. In addition to requiring experience to use, the engine needs an external computer to function, which can make it difficult to implement the solution.

Will contemporary medicine be able to restore movements of people suffering from some kind of brain trauma? Comment on TecMundo Forum

Via TecMundo.