Elon Musk says millions of people could be implanted with Neuralink chips in next decade

Elon Musk hopes to implant millions of people with his Neuralink brain chips within the next 10 years.

In a blog post on the Neuralink website, the team provided an update about the second device fitted into a human participant. In response, Musk then took to his X platform to share his hopes.

“Update about the second Neuralink device in a human.

“If all goes well, there will be hundreds of people with Neuralinks within a few years, maybe tens of thousands within 5 years, millions within 10 years, …”

Update about the second Neuralink device in a human.

If all goes well, there will be hundreds of people with Neuralinks within a few years, maybe tens of thousands within 5 years, millions within 10 years, … https://t.co/opy1xj5JgF

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 22, 2024

The neurotechnology company was founded by the Tesla CEO in 2016 and earlier this year, in January, when the first human implantation of the brain-computer interface took place.

This interface has been designed to give paralyzed patients the ability to use digital devices through their thoughts. It works by the chips inserting 64 tiny threads into the brain, all of which include several electrodes acting as the link between the brain and the chip. Then, the chip connects with an app so patients can control their devices with their thoughts.

Mitigations were included for second participant following Neuralink thread retraction

While the first participant, Norland Arbaugh, has continually praised the Neuralink, the implant didn’t go without problems. Some days after the initial implantation, many of the 64 threads retracted leaving just 15% of the chip’s electrodes in use.

The issue was then resolved and the team said they have been able to mitigate risks for future implants.

Arbaugh has commented on his experience: “I think it should give a lot of people a lot of hope for what this thing can do for them, first and foremost their gaming experience, but then that’ll translate into so much more and I think that’s awesome.”

The company then completed its second implantation of its device into a human in July and its recent progress update states that it ‘went well’ with Alex having been discharged the following day.

“To reduce the probability of thread retraction in our second participant, we implemented a number of mitigations, including reducing brain motion during the surgery and reducing the gap between the implant and the surface of the brain. We discussed these measures in greater detail in our live update prior to our second participant’s surgery.

“Promisingly, we have observed no thread retraction in our second participant,” said the Neuralink team.

Image Credit: Midjourney

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