What Neuralink and other BCIs can and can't do

Kusanagi Motoko, Johnny Mnemonic, Takeshi Kovacs, John Perry, Lenny Nero -- the practice of melding biological minds with electronics hardware is a cornerstone technology of modern cyberpunk literature. And, if certain medical device startup companies are to be believed, accomplishing similar cybernetic feats -- from downloadable memories to "Whoa, I Know Kung Fu"-style instantaneous learning -- could become reality sooner than we think. BCIs are, essentially, devices that read the electrochemical firing of the brain's myriad synapses, interprets and translates that signal into a digital format that can be understood by computers. Research on the technology began in the 1970s at the Brain Research Institute of University of California at Los Angeles under the watch of pioneering neurologist, Dr. Jacques J. Vidal. It took researchers more than two decades to sufficiently lay the basic technological groundwork needed to progress from animal models but by the mid-1990s the very first BCI prototypes were being installed in human craniums.