Scientists from the University of Bath have lately created an artificial neuron that could change the lives of numerous people.
For many years researchers and scientists were trying to find a cure for chronic diseases like Alzheimer’s or heart failure. Now they finally came up with a way to possibly heal all of those related to nervous systems with the help of a device smaller than a fingertip.
It is basically an artificial neuron with silicon chip that can imitate real living neurons in our bodies.
But what really is a neuron? It is a cell in a nervous system. It receives and transports electric impulses with information throughout the body. There are about 100 billion of them in our bodies and failure of at least one of them can change your life completely from what it was right before. On the other hand, if anything happens to your neurons it could be life-changing to have technology that could fix it and help your life get back to how it was.
“Until now neurons have been like black boxes, but we have managed to open the black box and peer inside […] Our work is paradigm-changing because it provides a robust method to reproduce the electrical properties of real neurons in minute detail”, said Alain Nogaret from the University of Bath.
They have demonstrated two types of artificial neurons (respiratory and hippocampal). To test them they tried about 60 protocols and compared how artificial chips react comparing to the real ones. 94% of attempts ended up successfully.
Even though it still needs years to possibly start being used in medical treatments, it is a huge step forward in technology and creates new possibilities for future researchers.
References:
https://newatlas.com/science/first-artificial-neurons-ever-created-chronic-brain-disease/