Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk on Friday showcased pigs with computer chips in their brains during his unveiling of Neuralink, an upcoming technology aiming to bring symbiosis between artificial intelligence and the human brain. The live showcase involved displaying real-time neural signals from one of the pigs, whom Musk named Gertrude, CNBC reported. Musk said the process for installing a Neuralink in a human brain would be an hourlong operation that is no more invasive than LASIK eye surgery, inserting a coin-sized device into the skull that would leave a tiny scar after the electrodes are inserted in the brain. He likened the technology to being essentially a "Fitbit in your skull." While the ambitious project has been under wraps since its announcement in 2016, Musk said the device could help fight memory loss, blindness and paralysis, among other medical conditions.

Elon Musk has unveiled a pig called Gertrude with a coin-sized computer chip in her brain to demonstrate his ambitious plans to create a working brain-to-machine interface. "It's kind of like a Fitbit in your skull with tiny wires," the billionaire entrepreneur said on a webcast. His start-up Neuralink applied to launch human trials last year. The interface could allow people with neurological conditions to control phones or computers with their mind. Mr Musk argues such chips could eventually be used to help cure conditions such as dementia, Parkinson's disease and spinal cord injuries.

The tech entrepreneur Elon Musk on Friday showed off a pig whose brain he says has been implanted with a small computer. "We have a healthy and happy pig, initially shy but obviously high energy and, you know, kind of loving life, and she's had the implant for two months," Musk said of Gertrude, the pig. The billionaire entrepreneur, whose other companies include Tesla and SpaceX, presented during a livestream event to recruit employees for his neuroscience startup Neuralink. He described Gertrude's coin-sized implant as "a Fitbit in your skull with tiny wires". Musk co-founded Neuralink in 2016 with the goal of creating a wireless brain-machine interface, something scientists hope can help cure neurological conditions and allow people with paralysis to control a computer mouse.