How This Brain Implant Uses ChatGPT

One of the leading companies working on implantable brain-computer interface, or BCI, is experimenting with integrating ChatGPT to make it easier for paralyzed people to control digital devices.

We previously covered Synchron’s unique approach to implanting BCIs without the need for open brain surgery. Now, the company has integrated OpenAI’s ChatGPT into its software in what it claims is a world-first for the company’s BCI solution.

We spoke to Synchron founder and CEO Tom Oxley and pioneering patient Mark, who stars in the demo video, to find out what it’s like to use the technology, where the integration of AI and brain implants might be heading, and what’s next.

Mark was diagnosed with ALS in 2021 and says he “almost lost the use of his hands” at that point. He is one of 10 people in the world to have Synchron’s BCI implanted in a clinical trial.

Typing out a message word by word using BCI still takes a long time. Adding AI is seen as a way to make communication faster and easier by taking into account relevant context, such as what was last said in a conversation, and anticipating the responses a person might want to make by providing them with a menu of possible options.

Now, instead of typing in every word, answers can be entered with a single “click.” There’s a refresh button in case none of the AI’s answers are correct, and Mark has noticed that the AI ​​is getting better at providing answers that are more in line with what he might be saying.

“Every now and then he’ll swear, which happens to me from time to time,” he says with a laugh.

Synchron CEO Tom Oxley told me the company has been experimenting with different AI models for about a year, but the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT-4o model in May brought some interesting new possibilities.

The letter “o” in ChatGPT-4o comes from the word “omni”, reflecting the fact that the latest version of the program can simultaneously accept text, audio, and visual data and process them into output.

One OpenAI demo in particular caught Oxley’s eye. It showed a visually impaired man navigating a city while AI described his surroundings and even helped him hail a taxi. Oxley imagines that the future of brain-computer interfaces will likely be similar: large language models like ChatGPT take in relevant context in the form of text, audio, and visualization to provide relevant suggestions that users can select via a brain-computer interface.

Oxley also says the company isn’t tied to any particular big language model. In the rapidly evolving field of AI, Synchron will adopt systems that best suit the needs of its patients.

The Synchron implant, called a stentrode, is implanted into a blood vessel near the brain’s motor cortex, the part of the brain that controls our movements. To click or make a selection with Synchron BCI, users think about movement, and the BCI interprets those thoughts and transmits them wirelessly to perform the desired action on the user’s device.

The Synchron BCI is expected to cost between $50,000 and $100,000, which is comparable to the cost of other implantable medical devices such as pacemakers or cochlear implants. There have been no implantable BCIs to gain market approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, something Synchron hopes to change. Although that process could take several years, the Synchron BCI is already making an impact.

“There’s hope coming,” Mark says, for anyone who might be in a similar situation. Mark ended our conversation by encouraging people to participate in finding solutions: “Anything I can do to help others, I think that’s why we’re here.”

To see Synchron’s BCI in action, watch the video attached to this article.