The Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency (DARPA) is working on a real time brain implant that will not only monitor your psychological state, but it will also intervene to correct it. The intervention will be done by an implanted device that applies "deep brain stimulation". Perhaps in the future, a soldier will be able to experience the horrors of war without it upsetting his mood.
DARPA developing implant to monitor brainwaves in real time
The Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency (DARPA) has launched a US$70 million project to develop an
implant to monitor neuronal activity in a bid to improve the mental
health of soldiers and veterans.
There is a high incidence of mental
illness among soldiers compared with the general population — in
fact, one in nine medical discharges is because of mental illness.
This is not surprising — if you ask people to do and see horrific
things, it's going to mess with their heads in pretty significant
ways.
DARPA is seeking to understand more
about how the brain works in the hope of developing effective
therapies for troops and veterans. It has announced a new project
called the Systems-Based Neurotechnology for Emerging Therapies
(SUBNETS).
SUBNETS is inspired by Deep Brain
Stimulation (DBS), a surgical treatment that involves implanting a
brain pacemaker in the patient's skull to interfere with brain
activity to help with symptoms of diseases like epilepsy and
Parkinson's. DARPA's device will be similar, but rather than
targeting one specific symptom, it will be able to monitor and
analyse data in real time and issue a specific intervention according
to brain activity.
"If SUBNETS is successful, it will
advance neuropsychiatry beyond the realm of dialogue-driven
observations and resultant trial and error and into the realm of
therapy driven by quantifiable characteristics of neural state,"
DARPA program manager Justin Sanchez said. "SUBNETS is a push
toward innovative, informed and precise neurotechnological therapy to
produce major improvements in quality of life for service members and
veterans who have very few options with existing therapies. These are
patients for whom current medical understanding of diseases like
chronic pain or fatigue, unmanageable depression or severe
post-traumatic stress disorder can't provide meaningful relief."
