Quadriplegic man regains use of arm in medical first, thanks to artificial brain-muscle link

A decade after a bike crash that left him a quadriplegic, an American man has regained use of his arm and can again feed himself, thanks to a medical-first artificial link between his brain and his muscles, researchers announced on Wednesday.

The remarkable advance hinges on a prosthesis which circumvents rather than repairs his spinal injury, using wires, electrodes as well as computer software to reconnect the severed link between his brain and arm.

“To our knowledge, this is the first instance in the world of a person with severe and chronic paralysis directly using their own brain activity to move their own arm and hand to perform functional movements,” said lead study author Bolu Ajiboye of Case Western Reserve University in the United States.

The study’s only patient, 56-year-old Bill Kochevar, has two surgically-implanted clusters of electrodes - each no bigger than an aspirin - in his head to read his brain signals, which are interpreted by a computer.

His muscles then receive their instructions from electrodes in his arm.

After around ten years of immobility, this has allowed Kochevar to sip coffee, scratch his nose and eat mashed potatoes in laboratory tests.

To overcome gravity that would otherwise prevent him from raising his limb, Kochevar uses a mobile support, which is also under his brain’s control, according to the study published in The Lancet medical journal.

Though the prosthesis remains experimental, the researchers hope their work will one day help people with paralysis do daily tasks on their own.