Failure for Elon Musk. The first implanted Neuralink chip began to detach from the patient’s brain

Neuralink’s first attempt at implanting a chip in a human brain was an unexpected failure. The device began to detach from the patient’s brain, the company revealed, according to The Guardian.

The patient, Noland Arbaugh, underwent surgery in February to have a Neuralink chip attached to his brain. The device’s functionality began to decline within a month of receiving the implant.

Some of the device’s wires, which connect the miniature computer to the brain, had begun to come loose.

Neuralink did not disclose why the device partially withdrew from the patient’s brain, but said in a blog post that its engineers were able to restore the chip’s functionality.

The chip’s low capabilities did not appear to endanger Noland, and he was still able to use it, for example, to play a game of chess on a computer using his thoughts, according to the Wall Street Journal, which reported for first news about the implant issue.

The possibility of extracting the implant was considered.

Noland Arbaugh’s implant began experiencing problems in late February, according to Neuralink’s blog post, when an undisclosed number of the chip’s wires “pulled away from the brain, resulting in a net decrease in the number of effective electrodes.”

This lowered the device’s bits per second, which is essentially an indicator of how well the implant could perform its tasks.

Neuralink, which Elon Musk owns and was valued at about $5 billion last year, has widely touted the success of its first implant, positioning itself as a world leader in brain chip technology.

Although the device is still in its early stages, the company’s disclosure brings more attention to the untested and complicated nature of the experimental procedure.

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