Monthly Insights
BCIs in Healthcare Clinical Practices
March 2025:Clinical Trial for ALS Communication: Cognixion announced the launch of a clinical trial of its “Axon-R” augmented reality BCI headset to help late-stage ALS patients communicate. This noninvasive device combines EEG-based brain signals with AI and AR to enable “thought-to-speech” conversations for patients who have lost the ability to speak biospace.com.
Cognixion’s Axion R: Cognixion®
April 2025:Funding for Stroke Patient BCI: The Marcus Foundation awarded a $29.7 million grant to a Stanford–University of Michigan team to develop an implantable BCI for stroke patients with aphasia (loss of speech). The project will build tiny, wireless brain sensors to decode words from intact language areas of the brain, aiming to restore patients’ ability to “speak” via a computer interface news.engin.umich.edu.
May 2, 2025:BCI Restores Computer Use in ALS: University of California, Davis researchers reported a breakthrough BCI that enabled an ALS patient to control a computer cursor and click using signals from the speech motor cortex. In a Journal of Neural Engineering study, a participant with advanced ALS used a single implanted sensor in a speech-related brain area to independently type and navigate his personal computer for daily tasks medicalxpress.com.
BCIs in Medical Practices and Surgeries
March 2025:China’s BCI Implant Milestone: NeuCyber (Beijing) completed the third human implantation of its “Beinao No.1” semi-invasive wireless BCI chip at Tiantan Hospital. By the end of March, three paralyzed patients had received this implant, which sits on the brain’s surface. The team announced plans to implant 10 more patients in 2025, positioning China to lead in BCI trial scale reuters.com.
May 2025:Neuralink’s Device Fast-Tracked: Elon Musk’s Neuralink announced it earned an FDA Breakthrough Device designation for its brain implant intended to restore communication in people with severe speech impairments. The designation, granted to accelerate development and review, covers Neuralink’s BCI for patients with conditions such as ALS, stroke, or cerebral palsy that cause an inability to speak or type reuters.com.
May 2025:Restoring Touch via BCI Surgery: In a novel clinical case, surgeons at New York’s Feinstein Institutes implemented a “double neural bypass” BCI to restore movement and sensation in a man with quadriplegia spectrum.ieee.org. Five tiny chips were surgically implanted in the patient’s motor and sensory cortices, allowing brain signals to bypass his injured spine. As a result, he not only regained motor control of his arm but also felt tactile feedback via the implants – for example, sensing touch when holding objects.
BCIs in Dental Practices and Surgery
March 2025:Brain-to-Voice Speech Prosthesis: Researchers from UC Berkeley and UCSF unveiled a BCI-based “brain-to-voice” prosthesis that can stream decoded speech in real time. Using an AI model, the system translates neural activity from speech motor areas into audible sentences with only a slight delay. Reported in Nature Neuroscience, this breakthrough could eventually benefit patients who lose the ability to speak (for example, due to neurological or oral cancers), by providing a natural-sounding voice prosthesis engineering.berkeley.edu.