New AI turns brainwaves into complex speech

The result wasn’t perfect. Whilst the artificial neural network did well at decoding fricatives – sounds like the ‘sh’ in ‘ship’ – it often stumbled at plosives, such as the ‘b’ in ‘bob’. The resulting sounds are distinctly human, but perhaps a human whose had one too many G&Ts.

In order to get the data for the anatomical AI, the scientists had native English-speaking volunteers read out lists of one hundred words, then interpret sentences fed back to them from the algorithm.

The neurological AI was a little more complicated to manage. The team worked with five people who already had high-density electrode arrays installed in their skulls for the treatment of epilepsy. These devices need to be installed surgically under the scull – an invasive, dangerous surgery which limits the potential of this tech to hit the market anytime soon.

But Professors Grayden and Oxley, and other teams around the world including Elon Musk’s start-up Neuralink, are working on less-invasive methods.

Their solution is to attach electrodes to tiny, hollow, tube-like scaffolds and then float those scaffolds into blood vessels in the brain. They could sit there, reading brain signals, without interfering with blood flow or the brain. Like a little tiny brain pet.

A human trial is planned for later this year. Any volunteers?