Author:Doug Tierney

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If you enjoyed the high tech concepts in "The Portable Girlfriend", then you might enjoy seeing how in less than 10 years science fiction is becoming hard technology. The BrainGate chip developed by CyberKinetics is a serious step toward a practical brain-computer interface, though challenges remain in making the interface a long-term implantable device. Professor John Donoghue of Brown University and Professor Theodore W. Berger of USC are names to watch as this technology goes forward.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Veterans' Administration, and the US Army have all recently taken a keen interest in advancing brain-computer interfaces, primarily as a means of controlling advanced prosthetics for severely injured veterans (called "polytrauma injuries"). Practical implementation may be less than 10 years away.