Brains of 3 monkeys linked together lead to encouraging results.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: Scientists have linked together the brains of three monkeys, allowing the animals to collectively control an avatar arm, in research that raises the prospect of direct brain-to-brain interfaces in humans.
In a second experiment, the brains of four rats were wired together in a “brain net”, enabling the rodents to synchronize their neuronal activity and collaboratively solve a simple weather forecasting problem that individual rats struggled to complete, according to The Guardian.
“The rats could divide tasks across animals, so their individual workload was much smaller,” Nicolelis told LiveScience. “We didn’t expect that in the beginning.”
One potential clinical application of this research is to link paralyzed patients with healthy volunteers to help them learn how to move again, or help patients learn how to control robotic limbs or exoskeletons, said lead scientist Miguel Nicolelis, who made the breakthrough at Duke University Medical Center.
“Essentially we created a super-brain,” he said, referring to the procedure involving the monkeys. “A collective brain created from three monkey brains. Nobody has ever done that before.”
He also predicts his research might pave the way for “organic supercomputers” — collectives of animal brains linked together to solve problems, reported The Guardian.
“We hope to be able to report data on such research in a few months,” Nicolelis said. “One day this could also help stroke patients, epilepsy patients and patients with other neurological disorders. Also, this could be done non-invasively, instead of having to use implants like we did in our experiments with monkeys and rats.”
Nicolelis and his team detailed their findings in two studies within the journal Scientific Reports.