Abstract
Recent advances in neuroscience and technology have made it possible to record from large assemblies of neurons and to decode their activity to extract information. At the same time, available methods to stimulate the brain and influence ongoing processing are also rapidly expanding. These developments pave the way for advanced neurotechnological applications that directly read from, and write to, the human brain. While such technologies are still primarily used in restricted therapeutic contexts, this may change in the future once their performance has improved and they become more widely applicable. Here, we provide an overview of methods to interface with the brain, speculate about potential applications, and discuss important issues associated with a neurotechnologically assisted future.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 598-610 |
Number of pages | 13 |
Journal | Trends in Cognitive Sciences |
Volume | 22 |
Issue number | 7 |
Early online date | 2 May 2018 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Jul 2018 |
Funding
This work was supported by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO; VENI grant 451.13.023 , P.C.K.; ALW grant 823-02-010 , P.R.R.) and the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program (grant agreement 7202070 ‘Human Brain Project SGA1’, P.R.R.; European Research Council (ERC) grant agreement 339490 ‘Cortic_al_gorithms’, P.R.R.). We thank Victor Lamme for insightful comments during the early phases of writing.
Funders | Funder number |
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Horizon 2020 Framework Programme | 339490, 785907 |
European Research Council | |
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek | 823-02-010, 451.13.023 |
Horizon 2020 | 7202070 |
Keywords
- augmented cognition
- brain–computer interface
- consciousness
- mind-reading
- neurotechnology
- stimulation