Great report from Ashley Capoot at CNBC on a recent clinical case testing Precision Neuroscience’s brain-computer interface (BCI), which is designed to help patients with severe paralysis, restoring functions like speech and movement. Ashley was in the operating room at Mount Sinai Health System as surgeons implanted 4 Precision microelectrode arrays on a patient’s brain, streaming cortical data from over 4,000 channels—a new world record. The team was able to detect signals from the patient’s individual fingers. Her story breaks down what high resolution neural data like this could mean for medicine and vividly conveys what it feels like to be in the room as scientific history is being made. Give it a read:
In April, I got to watch the Precision Neuroscience team test its technology during a brain surgery at the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City. Precision is a three-year-old startup building a brain-computer interface, or a BCI, that could eventually help patients with severe paralysis restore functions like speech and movement. This procedure marked the 14th time that Precision has implanted its array on a human patient’s brain, and the company notched some new milestones. Its technology detected signals from the patients' individual fingers, and it set a record for the highest number of electrodes to ever be placed on the brain in real-time. There's a lot that goes into testing a new medical device, and Precision still has work to do before it achieves some of its loftier goals. Even so, this surgery was a good example of the "baby steps" it takes to get there. Many thanks to Precision, Mount Sinai and the patient for letting me observe!