SANJITA SRINATH

This summer, as I worked in the Viventi Lab, I got a small sneak peek into the thrilling world of embedding neuro-electronics. I got to work with a group of people working on cutting edge technology to bring new technological solutions to the confusing world of biology that’s stumped so many scientists.

I recently read this article about AI giving a paralyzed woman the opportunity to speak again, and it struck a chord. Maybe one day we can have a similar implantable device that can bring back lost memories, or protect soon-to-be lost memories.

This team built an implantable electrode to be placed into the brain area responsible for speech and then began using machine learning to interpret the signals. I was reminded of similar work that had been carried out in the Viventi Lab while I was there, where they were attempting to do something similar.

There are still so many questions that are yet to be answered, such as the “cat” question. This is a question one of my mentors posed in a lab meeting when discussing an implantable electrode for speech, and it’s one that I think of a lot. In essence it goes like this…

A human wants to say the word “cat”. What do they think of to get to that word. Is it the sounds “cuh” – “aa” – “tuh” or is it “caa” – “tuh”. How are they “sounding” out the word? Or are they even sounding out the word? What if they’re just thinking of a cat or the image of one?

Update on Nov 10 (New article by Viventi Lab about this electrode: https://today.duke.edu/2023/11/duke-scientists-create-brain-implant-may-enable-communication-thoughts-alone)