The first patenting from Los Angeles-based Ecate LLC sees the company’s founder, Allesandro Maggi, describe a bi-directional, closed-loop spinal cord machine interface that can bridge the gap in communication between the brain and the body in paralyzed patients.

Scientists spread across Europe and the U.S. filed for protection of an implantable electrode array including a plurality of microneedles, which may be implanted into the auditory nerve bundle and stimulate the auditory nerve in response to receiving electrical signals representative of observed sounds.

Synchron Inc. has acquired an equity stake in German manufacturer Acquandas GmbH in a move that will strengthen the company’s innovation and supply chain for its brain-computer interface system, Synchron founder and CEO Tom Oxley said.

Researchers from three California-based institutions are seeking patent protection for systems, devices and methods that allow brain-controlled limb movement and sensation.

Medical technology company Synchron Inc. completed an AU$110 million (US$73.9 million) series C round that will allow the company to conduct a feasibility study and pivotal trial of its implantable brain computer interface that can interpret and stimulate parts of the brain.

Stimulating the brain via implanted electrodes is used to treat both movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, and some psychiatric conditions such as obsessive compulsive disorder. But researchers are also working on ways to make such implanted electrodes listen instead of talk – and translate neuronal signals for people that have lost the ability speak, or the ability to move.

Stimulating the brain via implanted electrodes is used to treat both movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, and some psychiatric conditions such as obsessive compulsive disorder. But researchers are also working on ways to make such implanted electrodes listen instead of talk – and translate neuronal signals for people that have lost the ability speak, or the ability to move. At the Neurophysiology: Decoding and Neural Processing II session of the 2022 Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in San Diego, researchers from the Wyss Center for Bio and Neuroengineering (Switzerland) presented a device implanted in the brain that allowed restoration of movement and speech.

Synchron Inc. closed out 2021 by providing an opening for a patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) to send the first thought transferred to a tweet via an implantable brain computer interface. Philip O’Keefe, who received one of the company’s Stentrode implants in April 2020, took over the Twitter account of Sychron CEO Thomas Oxley to say, “Hello, World. Short tweet. Monumental progress.”

The FDA granted Blackrock Neurotech LLC breakthrough device designation for its Moveagain brain-computer interface (BCI) system as it targets 2022 for commercialization of the neural implant. Earlier this year, the Salt Lake City-based company received $10 million from investors including, Re.Mind Capital, Sorenson Impact and Facebook investor Peter Thiel to expand its clinical program. The company said its technology could be key to providing tetraplegic patients the ability to control devices directly from the brain.