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After the first person received a chip implanted by Musk's brain-computer interface company Neuralink in January this year, Musk recently revealed that his company has successfully implanted the device in the brain of a second patient. Musk said that the operation, which aims to help paralyzed patients use electronic devices by thinking, went "very smoothly."

▲Photo from ICphoto

The second patient's brainImplantationchip

400 electrodes are working

Neuralink is currently testing its device with the goal of helping people with spinal cord injuries, and the device has reportedly enabled the first patient to play video games, browse the internet, make social media posts, and move a cursor on a laptop.

Musk said in a more than eight-hour podcast released late Friday that the second participant had a spinal cord injury similar to the first patient, who was paralyzed in a diving accident. Musk revealed that the 400 implanted electrodes in the second patient's brain are working. Neuralink's website states that the implant uses 1,024 electrodes.

"The second implant seemed to go very well," Musk said in an interview. "There was a lot of signal, a lot of electrodes, and it worked very well."

▲Musk picture from Visual China

Musk did not say when Neuralink performed the surgery on the second patient. He said Neuralink plans to provide implants to eight more patients in clinical trials this year.

The first patient had a device failure

Company: Algorithm has been modified

The first patient, Nolan Abo, was also interviewed on the podcast, and three Neuralink executives detailed the implanted device and the robot-led surgical process.

Before Abo received the implant in January, he used a stick in his mouth to operate the tablet screen. Now, Abo says, he can just think about what he wants to do on the computer screen, and the device makes it happen. He says the device has given him some independence and reduced his reliance on caregivers.

After the surgery, Abo initially encountered problems when the tiny wires of the implanted device shrank, causing a sharp reduction in the number of electrodes that could measure brain signals. Neuralink was reportedly aware of this problem in animal trials.

Neuralink said it had restored the implant's ability to monitor Abo's brain signals by modifying the algorithm to increase its sensitivity, among other improvements. Musk mentioned in the podcast that Abo broke his previous world record for cursor speed control using only his mind, with only about 10% to 15% of the electrodes working properly.

Musk also said he had spoken to former U.S. President Donald Trump, whom he supported in the U.S. presidential campaign, about forming a commission aimed at making government more efficient by reducing business regulations, which Musk believes have hampered innovation.

As early as January 30 this year, Musk announced that the first human to receive a Neuralink implant was currently recovering well. Musk called this product "telepathy" and explained that this means that the implanted person can control his mobile phone or computer just by thinking, and through them control almost any device.

Red Star News reporter Wang Yalin and intern Wei Yi

Editor Yang Ran Responsible Editor Deng Qiguang