Giant stride: Computer bypasses damaged spine, allowing paralysed man to walk
PUBLISHED : Thursday, 24 September, 2015, 4:06pm
UPDATED : Thursday, 24 September, 2015, 4:06pm
Reuters in Los Angeles
Former graduate student Adam Fritz, 28, who severed his spinal cord in a motorcycle accident, is shown during a brain-computer interface experiment at UC Irvine's iMove Lab in Irvine, California
A brain-to-computer technology that can translate thoughts into leg movements has enabled a man paralysed from the waist down by a spinal cord injury to become the first such patient to walk without the use of robotics, doctors in Southern California reported.
The slow, halting first steps of the 28-year-old paraplegic were documented in a preliminary study published on Wednesday in the British-based Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation, along with a YouTube video.
The feat was accomplished using a system allowing the brain to bypass the injured spinal cord and instead send messages through a computer algorithm to electrodes placed around the patient’s knees to trigger controlled leg muscle movements.
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine, say the outcome marks a promising but incremental achievement in the development of brain-computer interfaces that may one day help stroke and spinal injury victims regain some mobility.
Dr An Do, a study co-author, said clinical applications were many years away. Results of the UC Irvine research still need to be replicated in other patients and greatly refined.
Nevertheless, the study proved it possible “to restore intuitive, brain-controlled walking after a complete spinal cord injury,” said biomedical engineer Zoran Nenadic, who led the research.
The steps taken a year ago by the experiment’s subject, former graduate student Adam Fritz, who injured his back in a motorcycle accident, appear modest as seen in the video.
Fritz propelled himself over a distance of 3.6 meters across the floor of UC Irvine’s iMove Lab, though his weight was partially supported by an overhead suspension harness and a walker he grasped to keep his body upright, researchers said.
The weight support was necessary because the patient lacked any sensation in his legs or feet, Do explained.
