For the first time, scientists have created a brain implant that can "hear" and vocalize words a person is only imagining in their head.
The device, developed at Stanford University in California, could help people with severe paralysis communicate more easily, even if they can't move their mouth to try to speak.
"This is the first time we've managed to understand what brain activity looks like when you just think about speaking," Erin Kunz, lead author of the study, published Thursday in the journal Cell, told the Financial Times.
"For people with severe speech and motor impairments, brain-computer interfaces capable of decoding inner speech could help them communicate much more easily and more naturally," said Kunz, a postdoctoral scholar in neurosurgery.
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