Parkinson's Disease and Brain Prosthetics?"

Could “brain prosthetics” be the futuristic fix for Parkinson’s Disease. Given the fact that Deep Brain Stimulation already uses neural implants hooked up to a type of pacemaker, I say Why Not?

US News and World Report recently had an article about neuroengineers and some neuroengineering work at MIT that could potentially be applied to treat Parkinson’s Disease. (I have to say that I find it fascinating that a discipline such as neuroengineering even exists. Just think if you’d heard about this type of work 20 years ago and what you would have thought.) The article talked about research into robotic exoskeletons, better prosthetic arms and legs, and the most interesting to me, the development of a “tiny LED light switch” that could be implanted into the brain to treat patients with conditions such as Parkinson’s or blindness. The idea is to use this tiny device as a “stoplight, turning neurons on and off in a thousandth of a second.”

Obviously this type of research having real life applications is a little ways off, but I have no doubt that we will see these ideas and therapies becoming realities in the next 10 years. I highly recommend reading this short article. It won’t take you more than 5 minutes.

http://www.usnews.com/articles/science/medical-science/2008/07/24/will-upgrades-enhance-our-bodies.html