Brain Power Harnessed to Control Hand Movement 
By: Patricia Reaney 

LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists in the United States have developed a device to
harness the power of thought to control movement in a finding that could one
day help to restore some independence to paralyzed people.  

The device was implanted into the brains of three Rhesus monkeys and
connected to a computer but researchers at Brown University in Rhode Island
said it could potentially be useful for humans.  

"We substituted thought control for hand control," said John Donoghue, who
led the research project reported in the journal Nature.  

The scientists used thin electrodes to record what happened in the brain when
a hand is moved to control a computer cursor and used mathematical formulas
and a computer to decode the activity and replicate the action using the
brain alone.  

The technology allowed the monkey's brain, not its hand, to move the cursor.  

"As far as we know, no one has been able to get a cursor to move around this
quickly and accurately," Mijail Serruya, one of the research scientists, said
in a telephone interview.  

"It paves the way for future medical devices," he added.  

Serruya described it as an encouraging step and said the scientists have
formed a company to try to apply the technique to a medical device. They hope
to use the technology to try to restore some control and communication to
paralyzed people.  

YEARS OF RESEARCH AHEAD 

"Our goal is to make sense of how brain plans move a hand through space and
to use that information as a control signal for someone who is paralyzed. We
want to provide some freedom to these individuals," Serruya said.  

The monkeys played a simple video game using a mouse-like hand control. When
the scientists cut off the hand control the monkeys continued to play the
game but the movement of the cursor was controlled by brain signals.  

The animals were not aware the control was switched off but they kept hitting
the targets.  

An array of tiny electrodes recorded, decoded and reconstructed the activity
of several neurons that control the hand movement. Even a small number of
neurons, from six to 30, can control movement.  

"We showed we could build a signal that works right away, in real time. And
we can do it recording from as few as six neurons," Donoghue explained in a
statement.  

A similar device for humans is years away and would require approval from the
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) but the scientists believe it could
eventually help paralyzed patients read e-mails, surf the Internet and
perform other functions through a computer.  

Serruya said the first human applications, after the results are confirmed by
further studies and the technique is approved through the regulatory process,
would probably be for the most severely disabled people who have no ability
to communicate.  

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020313/sc_nm/science_brain_dc_1016047618&cid=585



Monkey Moves Cursor by Thinking 
By: Alex Dominguez

A monkey with a fingernail-size brain implant moved a cursor on a computer
screen just by thinking - the latest in a series of experiments that have
raised hopes that paralyzed people might one day be able to control complex
devices with their minds. 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21153-2002Mar13.html