Memory Implants
A memory prosthesis being trialed next year could not only repair loss of long-term memory but could potentially be used as a model of how to upload new skills and memories directly into our brains.
A new human memory prosthesis will be tested next year could not only restore long-term recall but may eventually be used to upload new skills and memories directly to the brain according to researcher Theodore (Ted) Berger.
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The first trials will be undertaken on patients with epilepsy. Seizures can sometimes damage the hippocampus, causing the brain to be unable to form long-term memories.To repair this functionality, Berger, a biomedical engineer and a developer of neuro-prosthesis technology models, will use brain implants to try to replace damaged or dysfunctional nerve tissue. His colleagues at the University of Southern California have already used electrodes implanted in people’s brains as part of epilepsy treatment to record electrical activity associated with memory.
The team has also developed an algorithm that could predict the neural activity thought to occur when a short-term memory becomes a long-term memory, as it passes through the hippocampus.
"There is good reason to believe that the sharing of memory can happen."
Next year, Berger’s team will use this algorithm to communicate between the electrodes and the subjects' brains to help predict and then mimic the activity that should occur during long-term memories formation.“Hopefully, it will repair their long-term memory,” says Berger. Previous studies using animals suggest that the prosthesis might even give people a better memory than they could expect naturally.
A similar approach could eventually be used to implant new memories into the brain. “There is good reason to believe that the sharing of memory can happen,” says Berger.
DARPA is also seeking to accelerate the development of memory implant technology.
Berger’s team recorded brain activity in a rat that had been trained to perform a specific task. The memory implant then replicated that activity in a rat that hadn’t been trained. The second rat was able to learn the task much faster than the first rat – as if it already had some memory of the task.
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