New Implantable Bluetooth Memory Chip Prototype

GarysLens/Pixabay

This prototype gives users the means of a new form of communication and data storage, controlled only by the mind.

By Patrick James Hibbert 

25 SEP 2020

In a recent study, researchers from Augmanity Nano, Faculty of Life Sciences, and Gonda Brain Center in Isreal developed a new, implantable, memory tag prototype that could be written to and read from by multiple people within close proximity to each other. 

The device sticks onto the neck and integrates a processor, a memory chip (controller), and an RFID circuit. It analyzes EEG signals, has 4 KB of RAM, and transmits data to other controllers and computers, on to which, the sender's binary thoughts are displayed.

Deemed potentially very useful, it could aid many people with “bad memories”, memory disorders, and injuries impairing their memories. Such as people with head trauma, infarcts, diseases, and even those experiencing the side effects of drugs. 

This tag could also supplement the lack of access to writing pads, audio recorders, and computers at times when they are not available to us. Be it because they were either not brought, lost, stolen, or damaged. And in educational settings, it could be used to track and measure a student’s attention to lesson plans; providing informational feedback, which in turn could be used to adjust teaching strategies towards more engaging methods. 

The participants were 5 women and 4 women between the ages of 18 and 43. They typically were able to maintain a maximum of 3 writing actions without returning to baseline. However, their transitions did become slower with time. Interestingly, the ability to maintain transition efficiency did not correlate with their age. T

hey could observe the numbers they displayed, read and write to the controllers on their neck, and the controllers of others around them. All in all, they were able to effectively used a new social communication network. 

The above diagram shows social communication achieved between two people who can read and write to both their's and each other's memory chip. The researchers say the data stored may even be converted into other languages. 

The inventors of this new social communication method say implantable memory devices raise unique privacy issues such as unauthorized reading and inadvertent manipulation. Physical proximity does offer protection but limits social applications. 

They say to utilize the systems full capabilities it needs to be designed with specific layers of security addressing it's unique challenges, which include interference from adjacent devices and cyber attacks on the device.

The ability to communicate in a standard network like near field communication described here may offer a connection to other devices and may correlate to other languages in future work.

The capability of this new system is vast. It can be expanded to a model that involves the transmission of thoughts from one person to the public, be implantable, which the researchers are currently working on, and be upgraded above 4 KB of memory. They also mention the possibility of it's messages being displayed onto contacts or Google glasses. And with tweaks to the parameters of their system, errors in bit transmission could be reduced. 

Ultimately, their goal is to extend human memory and brain capacity beyond the limits we have today and their new device is the first of its kind with a promising future.