Think to Move

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/innovation/09/01/prosthetic.limb.thought.control/index.html
click on the link above for the news story


How many times have you seen news stories about cancer victims, cancer survivors, military personnel, even the everyday human being, that have lost limbs. Most of the time, these news stories are about the struggle of getting used to a prosthetic limb... the recovery, the rehabilitation, the training.
Imagine if you will... a robotic prosthesis that is powered by thoughts alone. U.S researchers are working on this new technology that, if it is successful, will allow the wearer to operate their prosthetic limb by thinking about what they are trying to do, as if it were their natural appendage.
Beginning in October 2011, researchers at Johns Hopkins University and the University of Pittsburgh will start testing this technology. The test patients will be spinal cord injury patients whose brains have been implanted with a 2mm by 2mm electrode array. It amazes me that something that is 2 square millimeters will possibly be able to give someone a sense of normalcy... whatever that may be.
The Modular Prosthetic Limb or MPL weighs in at about 9 pounds, which apparently is about the weight of a normal arm.
I'm sure there will be bugs to figure out with the technology.  but the mere idea of something like this possibly becoming available to the medical industry is spectacular.
A couple of years ago, I remember reading something about researchers in Japan working on a similar technology. They developed a wheelchair that is powered by electrical signals from the brain.
It is so saddening to me that, in relation to other things, how little is spent on medical research. This project was a part of a $100m program run by DARPA for prosthetics, while the U.S. is trillions of dollars in debt.