FDA OK’s Elon Musk’s Neuralink to implant brain chip into second patient: report

The Food and Drug Administration will allow Elon Musk’s brain chip company Neuralink to implant its device into a second patient as early as next month, according to a report.

The federal agency was apparently satisfied by Neuralink’s proposals to fix the errors that were reported in the company’s first patient, Noland Arbaugh, the 30-year-old quadriplegic who has managed to control a cursor on a computer screen using just his thoughts as well as play games and communicate with friends.

News of the FDA’s approval was first reported by The Wall Street Journal on Monday.

Earlier this month, Neuralink disclosed that the implant’s tiny wires, which are thinner than a human hair, retracted from Arbaugh’s brain, resulting in fewer electrodes that could measure brain signals.

Neuralink learned that Arbaugh’s brain moved up to three times what the company expected — resulting in the wires retracting, according to the Journal.

The company knew from animal testing it had conducted ahead of its US approval last year that the wires might retract, removing with them the sensitive electrodes that decode brain signals, Reuters reported last week.