What if our neurons could directly capture a rat’s sensations or a bat’s echoes? For Rowan Hooper, a scientific journalist and editor-in-chief of New Scientist, advances in neurobiology make this scenario conceivable, even if evolutionary biology already outlines its limits. From the complete mapping of a fly’s brain in 2016 to the 2013 experiment connecting two rats to exchange sensory information, there are milestones. Tomorrow, wireless electrodes and an AI translator could graft a rat’s vision or a bird’s flight proximity onto our perceptions, while raising a simple yet weighty question: what cost for the animal?
A step towards fascinating technology
The idea may seem like science-fiction, yet it is gaining ground. Researchers and scientific journalists, starting with the British Rowan Hooper, are exploring the possibility of connecting a human brain to that of an animal. Such an interconnection, through wireless electrodes and cutting-edge algorithms, could disrupt our senses and the way we perceive the world. The track brings together neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and artificial intelligence, with uses that are difficult to completely grasp.
Advancements that change the game
This future does not start from scratch, it is based on very concrete milestones. In 2016, teams published the deep mapping of connections in a fly’s brain, a technical feat that set a precedent. And in 2013, the experience of connecting two rats directly showed that an individual could interpret the sensory signals of the other to perform a task. In fact, the progress of brain-to-brain interfaces and neural decoding now shift the question from whether it is possible to how to make it reliable and safe.
Immersing in new senses
Hooper envisions targeted connections to experience new senses, such as capturing how a rat “sees” the ground-level space. Who has never dreamed of flying like a bird and feeling the air’s dynamics on their wings? Very quickly, a biological limit arises, our brain is not designed to interpret certain animal patterns, and vice versa. One option would be to use an mediating AI to translate these flows, or even to simulate modalities like echolocation in a bat, closer to us evolutionarily than a cortical bird.
When science meets ethics
The excitement fades as we delve into the consequences, starting with animal welfare. Can we impose cerebral stimulations, with stress or pain, on a species in the name of human curiosity? Safeguards exist, ethics committees and the principles of the 3Rs are required, but they will need to toughen up if these experiments become more realistic. Ultimately, the speed of development will depend as much on the technique as on public debate, because no one wants to see these experiments shift into opacity or spectacular excess.
Source: New Scientist
