Charles Choi, LiveScience Contributor Date: 17 December 2012 Time: 12:50 PM ET
Jan Scheuermann, who has quadriplegia, brings a chocolate bar to her mouth using a robot arm she is guiding with her thoughts. Research assistant Elke Brown, M.D., watches in the background. CREDIT: UPMC
A woman paralyzed from the neck down is now able to use a robot arm to give high fives and help her eat chocolate, representing what may be the most advanced mind-controlled prosthetic hand developed for humans yet, researchers said.
"This is a spectacular leap toward greater function and independence for people who are unable to move their own arms," said researcher Andrew Schwartz at the University of Pittsburgh. "This technology, which interprets brain signals to guide a robot arm, has enormous potential that we are continuing to explore."
"As we move forward, we might find this is applicable to other types of traumatic brain injury .. http://www.livescience.com/23223-brain-injury-protection-athletes-soldiers-nsf-bts.html ," researcher Elizabeth Tyler-Kabara at the University of Pittsburgh told LiveScience. "The populations that we can apply this to might be as wide as our imagination is."
Genetic disease paralyzes
The woman, Jan Scheuermann, a mother of two children, once ran a successful business planning parties with murder-mystery themes. In 1996, she noticed her legs seemed to drag behind her, and within two years, her legs and arms weakened to the point that she required a wheelchair and an attendant to help her with dressing, eating, bathing and other daily activities. [See Photos of Jan Using the Prosthetic .. http://www.livescience.com/25598-quadriplegic-mind-controlled-prosthesis.html ]
[ Robotic Prosthetic Arm Controlled With The Mind | Video .. embedded .. same from YouTube .. ]
Scheuermann suffers from spinocerebellar degeneration, a genetic disease where connections between the brain and muscles slowly deteriorate. She is now tetraplegic (also called quadriplegic), meaning that she is paralyzed from the neck down, and cannot voluntarily move her arms or legs.
"I can't even shrug my shoulders," Scheuermann said. "But I have come to the conclusion that worrying about something is experiencing it twice. I try to dwell on the good things that I have."
A friend of Scheuermann's pointed out a 2011 video about research at the University of Pittsburgh on a man with tetraplegia, Tim Hemmes, that gave him the ability to move objects on a computer screen and reach out with a robot arm .. http://www.technewsdaily.com/5761-brain-controlled-robotic-arm-points-prosthetics.html .. to touch his girlfriend.
"Wow, it's so neat that he can do that," Scheuermann recalled thinking as she watched Hemmes. "I wish I could do something like that." She had her attendant call the researchers and say, "I'm a quadriplegic. Hook me up, sign me up! I want to do that!"
Brain-controlled prosthetic
The scientists developed microelectrode arrays that connect brain cells to electronic circuitry — square grids just 16 square millimeters large with 96 points that penetrate the brain's surface by about one-16th of an inch. They scanned Scheuermann's brain to determine exactly where to put these electronics, and in February, they implanted the devices into her left motor cortex, the part of the brain that controls movement of the right arm and hand. [9 Cyborg Enhancements Available Right Now .. http://www.technewsdaily.com/4865-9-cyborg-enhancements.html ]
the prosthetic arm, designed by the John Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU/APL) and funded by the U.S. Department of Defense's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). - CREDIT: DARPA and JHU/APL?.
These implants were linked to a robotic limb Scheuermann has named Hector, which is capable of joint and wrist movements comparable to that of a human hand.
"The prosthetic arm we used was very sophisticated, with many of the same arm and hand segments as that of its human counterpart," Schwartz told LiveScience.
Two weeks after implantation, on just the second day of training with the prosthetic .. http://www.livescience.com/12955-mind-trick-advance-prosthetics-110223.html , Scheuermann was able to move it freely using just her mind. Within a week of training, she could reach in and out, left and right, and up and down using the arm.
"What we did in the first week they thought we'd be stuck on for a month," Scheuermann said.
Scheuermann took part in a 13-week-long comprehensive training and testing program to control the prosthesis along seven degrees of freedom — types of motions the prosthetic's joints could perform, such as flexing the wrist back and forth, moving it from side to side, and rotating it clockwise and counterclockwise. Coming to the lab three times per week, she rapidly learned to reach and grasp blocks, cones and balls with the prosthesis, developing fluid and rapid control over skillful movements almost similar to that of a person with regular abilities.
"I would definitely do this again," Scheuermann told LiveScience. "I think I am very blessed for this coming into my life."
Reaching for chocolate
Scheuermann had told the research team, "I'm going to feed myself chocolate before this is over." Using Hector, Scheuermann savored some chocolate as the scientists applauded her feat. "One small nibble for a woman, one giant bite for BCI (brain-control interfaces)," Scheuermann said.
In the end, Scheuermann could use the prosthetic to reach for objects, adjust the opening of the prosthetic hand to grasp items of various shapes and sizes, and move them to desired locations. She was able to complete requested tasks with a success rate of up to 91.6 percent, and more than 30 seconds more quickly than she did at the start of the program.
The unprecedented speed at which Scheuermann adapted to the prosthesis is partly due to an innovative new way of connecting the participant's brain to the prosthesis. Brain-machine interfaces .. http://www.technewsdaily.com/5266-wheres-my-future-brain-computer-interface.html .. work by converting brain signals to computer signals. The researchers previously monitored the signals that brains give out when people move their arms, and designed the behavior of the prosthetic to match Scheuermann's brain activity when she thought about moving her arm as intuitively as possible. [10 Strange Facts About the Brain .. http://www.livescience.com/12916-10-facts-human-brain.html ]
"The result is a prosthetic hand, which can be moved far more accurately and naturalistically than previous efforts," Schwartz said.
Future research might seek to include sensors into the prosthetic so that patients might, for instance, be able to tell the difference between hot and cold, or smooth and coarse surfaces .. http://www.livescience.com/23709-blind-people-picture-reality.html . The prosthetics might also incorporate wireless technology, removing the need for connecting wires between the patients and the prosthetic.
"We're hoping this can become a fully implanted, wireless system that people can actually use in their homes without our supervision," said researcher Jennifer Collinger at the University of Pittsburgh and the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System. "It might even be possible to combine brain control with a device that directly stimulates muscles to restore movement of the individual's own limb."
Currently, the implants are scheduled to be removed after two more months of testing, because the FDA approved such tests with the understanding they were of limited duration.
"We can and have applied for an extension, which was approved and are currently assessing whether to continue beyond the date that was originally planned," Schwartz said.
"This is the ride of my life," Scheuermann said. "This is the roller coaster. This is skydiving. It's just fabulous, and I'm enjoying every second of it."
"What we need are volunteers," researcher Michael Boninger at the University of Pittsburgh told LiveScience. "What we need is funding."
The scientists detailed their findings online Dec. 16 the journal The Lancet.
Ian Burkhart, 24, who was paralyzed from the shoulders down regains the use of his hand through the use of neural bypass technology at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center --
Six years after being paralysed from the chest down, an American man can use his right hand to stir coffee and swipe a credit card, a groundbreaking study reported on Wednesday.
The unprecedented feat was made possible by computer software replacing the damaged spinal cord as the communication highway between Ian Burkhart's brain and his hand muscles.
"This is the first time a completely paralysed person has regained movement just by using their own thoughts," said researcher Chad Bouton of the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, New York.
Burkhart, a 24-year-old from Ohio, has a pea-sized chip in his head to read his brain signals, which are then deciphered by a computer and rerouted to the hand, wrist and finger muscles.
The muscles receive their instructions from an electrode sleeve worn on the right forearm -- with which Burkhart can now also swipe a credit card, pick up a spoon, hold a phone to his ear and play the cords of a guitar video game.
The US-based researchers hope their work, still in an early phase, will one day allow paralysed people to feed and dress themselves.
Their device, called NeuroLife, reroutes messages from the brain to the muscles, bypassing the spinal cord.
Two years ago, they reported a major breakthrough when Burkhart was able to open and close his hand.
-- IMAGE afp.com / NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP /
Six years after a diving accident left him paralysed, Ian Burkhart can use his right hand, controlled by his mind and aided by computer software -- With a lot more training, he has since refined his skills and can now grip a "stir stick" with his fingertips, and use it.
Burkhart broke his neck in a holiday diving accident aged 19 and was left quadriplegic -- meaning his arms and legs are paralysed.
"Doctors told me I'd broken my neck and that most likely I'd be able to move my shoulders around, but nothing else for the rest of my life," he told journalists in a teleconference ahead of the report's release.
- 'Now I can do it' -
He volunteered for the trial, Burkhart said, because he wanted to help people like himself regain their independence.
"Just not being able to use your hands does limit you quite a bit," he said. "I have to rely on other people for things."
Burkhart underwent surgery to have the chip implanted in the brain's motor cortex area, which controls movement.
The chip was attached on top of the skull to a "connector" linking it to a computer which Burkhart "trained" to read his mind and decode which movements he wanted to execute.
The command to open, clench or pinch is then relayed to an electrode sleeve on Burkhart's right arm.
"When we first hooked everything up... it was a big shot," he recounted.
-- IMAGE afp.com / NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP /
Ian Burkhart plays a guitar video game after regaining the use of his hand through the use of neural bypass technology --
"I hadn't moved in about three-and-a-half years at that point. Now it's something that's just so fluid it's kind of like it was before I had my injury.
"I just think about what I want to do, and now I can do it."
Some of the functions he has relearnt have the potential of changing his daily life for the better. But for now, he can only do them in the lab.
The researchers said they hope to improve the technology to help not only people with spinal cord injuries, but also those who suffered a stroke or traumatic brain injury.
"Maybe in a few years from now we can have a wireless system that allows a patient like Ian to be able to move his hand and his arm... without cables to connect," said Ali Rezai of Ohio State University.
"This becomes more streamlined hopefully over time, maybe integrated into your cellphone... communicating with your sleeve."
Several teams worldwide are researching ways to bypass a damaged spinal cord, many focusing on using the mind to control robotic limbs or exoskeletons.
But the holy grail is to allow quadriplegics to use their own limbs, limiting the need for surgery and prosthetics.
"If all the work we've been doing can help anybody get more independence back, I mean that's great," said Burkhart.
"I really cherish the independence I had before my injury, so if you can give someone that ability back, it's huge."
It was a test of concentration and brainwaves for US students at the University of Florida during what was billed as the first mind-controlled drone race.
Sixteen competitors wearing special headsets measuring the electrical activity of their brains used their powers of concentration to send drones down a nine-metre course to the finish line.
Photo: A competitor controls a drone with their mind at the University of Florida. (ABC News)
The students used a brain-computer interface (BCI) that enables a person to use brainwaves to control a computer or other device.
BCI programs are used to assist paralysed patients in using controllable prosthetic limbs.
-- "It's the first of its kind. It's the future." Professor Juan Gilbert --
"You start thinking and you hear that motor kick up and you know it kind of kicks you into a different mental state so you have to focus," said contestant Daniel Royer, a mechanical engineering student at the university.
Professor Juan Gilbert, chairman of the Computer and Information Science and Engineering Department at the University of Florida, said they had been doing research on BCI and decided to connect it to drones for the race.
"The implications are far beyond the race," he said.
"It's fascinating. It's the first of its kind. It's the future."
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