On the way to cyborgization
Cybernetic prostheses
Five facts about the device of cybermanipulators,
brain-computer interface and full body prostheticsAlexander Kaplan, Post-science
Meanwhile, cyber prostheses themselves are a special case of cybernetic manipulators who have been collecting watches and cars for decades, sewing slippers and mining soil on celestial bodies. In recent years, the principles of cybermanipulators have been used in the construction of prostheses that replace limbs in amputee patients.
1. Principles of operation of cybermanipulatorsThe prefix "cyber-" in all its applications only says that the control processes in these devices are continuously corrected by feedback from sensors that track the success of the target task.
In order, for example, to move a piece on a chessboard, the cybermanipulator must be provided not only with appropriate movers, but also with meters of the speed and direction of movement of the piece, detectors of its capture and correct retention, and most importantly – have a plan of target action. Only under the control of all these parameters is the appropriate action of the cyber device.
Currently, several companies in the world produce not only quite decent cybernetic prosthetics of arms and legs, but also cybernetic exoskeletal structures that attach to paralyzed body and limbs and allow you to literally lift a person from a hospital bed. High-performance computing technology and advanced algorithms make it possible with the help of cyber prostheses to adjust, for example, walking or running on flat terrain, capturing objects with an artificial brush, and so on. In Russia, the creation of similar structures in several scientific and production centers is now in full swing.
2. Brain-computer interfaceCyber prostheses and exoskeletons have one problem: despite the fact that they are provided with various sensors of the physical indicators of the action being performed, they do not have sensors of the intentions of the person they serve.
Meanwhile, it is our volitional efforts that determine the target tasks: to continue moving in a straight line, turn, go up or go downhill. This task of registering a person's intentions is being solved by the currently rapidly developing brain-computer interface technologies that allow brain signals to be connected directly with cyber prostheses. New bio-cybernetic prostheses and exoskeletons will be provided with information from the brain. Already, in many laboratories around the world and in our country, the first working samples of these hybrids of automatic action and human volitional efforts are being tested. For example, in our laboratory, a computer located on the line of recording the electrical activity of the brain already understands well which letter a person intended when typing, which command – right-left or up-down – he wants to mentally give to a manipulator or other device.
3. The introduction of electrodes into the brainIn biocybernetic prostheses, electronic computing automation is corrected by signals from the brain.
The main difficulty here is the registration and decoding of electrical signals from the brain. These signals or an electroencephalogram can be easily registered directly from the skin surface of the head – painlessly, practically and cheaply. However, the structure of this signal is extremely complex, since by its nature it is a reflection of the activity of hundreds of thousands of nerve cells. Therefore, its decoding provides insufficient information for fine control of the cybermanipulator. At the same time, if the electrodes are inserted directly into the brain, you can get the most accurate contact with the desired group of several dozen nerve cells and much more accurately capture the intention of a person. Moreover, in such a situation, the brain itself begins to adjust the activity of these neurons to the control of the prosthesis associated with them. At the end of 2012, almost simultaneously in two American laboratories, scientists managed, with the help of such implanted electrodes and corresponding algorithms for decoding the activity of neurons, to enable paralyzed patients to control an artificial arm by the force of intention alone. For the first time in many years of inactivity, with the help of this cybernetic hand, they were able, for example, to serve themselves a can of a drink or treat themselves to a chocolate bar. However, technologies with the introduction of electrodes into the brain are permissible only for extreme vital indications and require a real neurosurgical operation.
4. Cost and scope of cyber devicesNow is the time of rapid development of these technologies.
Every year, dozens of new scientific laboratories begin work on the development of cyber devices controlled by the brain, muscles and eye movements. It seems to me that in the next 3-5 years we will see what, in fact, these technologies can achieve. By this time, their cost, if you do not include the actual managed devices, can be compared with the cost of simple laptops and mobile phones. And the cost of the cyber devices themselves (cyber prostheses, cyber exoskeletons, and so on) it will not differ from the cost of similar designs without control from the brain.
I don't think we should expect any revolutionary changes in human life due to the massive spread of brain-controlled cyber prostheses and exoskeletons. However, it can be expected that a significant part of bedridden patients with severe disorders of the motor system will be able to get up and begin to move independently in an upright position. A much larger number of healthy people will start using wearable devices to broadcast mental macros: open the garage, submit an item when their hands are busy, dial a phone number, call a link on the Internet, and so on.
5. Full body prostheticsApparently, the main question that the human community will have to ask itself in the era of mass proliferation of neurointerface devices and related cyber structures will be the question of how acceptable it is for a person to have a complete prosthetics of the body as its main vital organs gradually fail.
Technologically, humanity will be prepared for this already in the next 25 years, since today experimental design developments are mostly being completed, and clinical trials, for example, prosthetics of the heart, kidneys, are moving into the phase.
About the author:
Alexander Kaplan – Doctor of Biological Sciences, Psychophysiologist, Professor of the Department of Human and Animal Physiology, Head of the Laboratory of Neurophysiology and Neurointerfaces at the Faculty of Biology of Lomonosov Moscow State University.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru04.12.2014