Science Corporation implants its vision-restoring chip in its first Stargardt disease patient

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Science Corporation CEO Max Hodak announced that the company has implanted its vision-restoring chip, PRIMA, into its first patient with Stargardt disease, an inherited eye disease that gradually destroys central vision. Hodak, the former president and co-founder of Neuralink, the brain implant company, explained on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt how the company’s work with PRIMA fits into its broader pursuit of a novel brain-computer interface (BCI).

Science Corporation 首席执行官 Max Hodak 宣布，该公司已将其视力恢复芯片 PRIMA 植入首位患有斯特格氏病（Stargardt disease）的患者体内。这是一种遗传性眼病，会逐渐破坏中央视力。曾任脑植入公司 Neuralink 总裁兼联合创始人的 Hodak 在 TechCrunch Disrupt 大会上解释了该公司在 PRIMA 上的工作如何融入其对新型脑机接口 (BCI) 的更广泛追求。

“The retina is part of the central nervous system,” Hodak said on stage. “We consider cochlear implants, retinal prostheses, motor prostheses, these are all different types of BCIs.” Hodak outlined a vision in which BCIs expand into a wide range of medical technology applications, rather than simply being a way to control computers.

“视网膜是中枢神经系统的一部分，”Hodak 在台上说道。“我们将人工耳蜗、视网膜假体、运动假体都视为不同类型的脑机接口。”Hodak 勾勒了一个愿景，即脑机接口将扩展到广泛的医疗技术应用领域，而不仅仅是作为控制计算机的一种方式。

While PRIMA is commercially available in Europe for patients who’ve lost their sight to geographic atrophy, an advanced form of age-related macular degeneration, the company believes its approach can be applied to multiple diseases, including Stargardt disease, which is currently considered incurable. Stargardt disease affects the outer retina, causing the gradual death of the eye’s light-sensing cells while potentially sparing the inner retina, the part that passes visual signals onto the brain.

虽然 PRIMA 在欧洲已可用于治疗因地图样萎缩（一种晚期年龄相关性黄斑变性）而失明的患者，但该公司认为其方法可应用于多种疾病，包括目前被认为无法治愈的斯特格氏病。斯特格氏病会影响视网膜外层，导致眼睛的光感细胞逐渐死亡，但可能会保留视网膜内层，即负责将视觉信号传递给大脑的部分。

It causes a central blind spot that gradually enlarges over time. Approximately 150,000 people worldwide have lost vision due to the disease. “One of the nice things about this device approach, when I was saying the brain’s a computer, vision is electrical potential, like electrical activity down the optic nerve,” Hodak said. “That’s all vision is to the brain, and so if you can get the optic nerve to signal the the rest of the brain correctly, then you can provide vision to it.”

它会导致一个随时间逐渐扩大的中央盲点。全球约有 15 万人因该疾病而失明。“这种设备方法的一个优点在于，正如我所说大脑是一台计算机，视觉就是电位，就像沿视神经传导的电活动一样，”Hodak 说。“对于大脑来说，视觉仅此而已，因此如果你能让视神经正确地向大脑的其他部分发送信号，那么你就能为它提供视觉。”

The company says its first patient with Stargardt disease received the PRIMA implant in May as part of its ongoing trial at the Sydney Eye Hospital in Australia. During the patient’s first rehabilitation session, he saw a letter, and during the second, he was able to read a word. To use the device, patients undergo an hour-long procedure that plants a small chip in the back of their eye, where the photoreceptors have degenerated.

该公司表示，其首位斯特格氏病患者于 5 月份在澳大利亚悉尼眼科医院接受了 PRIMA 植入手术，这是其正在进行的试验的一部分。在患者的第一次康复训练中，他看到了一个字母，而在第二次训练中，他已经能够读出一个单词。为了使用该设备，患者需要接受一个小时的手术，将一个小芯片植入眼后部光感受器退化的位置。

Then they wear camera-equipped glasses that transmit a view of the world to the chip. The implant essentially works like artificial photoreceptors. “The device that this patient has is a two millimeter by two millimeter implant placed under the in the back of the eye, and so it’s like looking through a straw,” Hodak said. “It is not a big field of view color vision. It’s a patch in their central vision where . . .it’s black and white, but it is sharp. It’s high-contrast sharp, and so they can see a couple letters at a time. The next step is to make the field of view bigger. So to make a bigger implant, you have to deal with the curvature of the eye, and we need to make the electrodes smaller so that we get closer to native levels of detail.”

随后，他们佩戴配有摄像头的眼镜，将外界景象传输到芯片上。该植入物本质上就像人工光感受器。“这位患者使用的设备是一个 2 毫米乘 2 毫米的植入物，放置在眼后部，所以就像透过吸管看东西一样，”Hodak 说。“这不是大视野的彩色视觉。它在他们的中央视野中形成一个区域……它是黑白的，但很清晰。它具有高对比度的清晰度，因此他们一次可以看到几个字母。下一步是扩大视野。为了制造更大的植入物，必须处理眼睛的曲率，我们需要将电极做得更小，以便更接近原生水平的细节。”

He continued, “I think we have a clear path. There’s a there’s a next ‘next generation’ that’s being worked on that’ll be in humans in the next year, and over the next five years, I think we’ll be able to get pretty close to native acuity.” When Hodak founded Science Corporation in 2021 after leaving Neuralink, the company outlined plans to develop advanced neural engineering and brain-computer interface technology. But first, the company wants to prove its methods work and develop a sustainable business, which is why it’s working to restore vision with the visually impaired.

他继续说道：“我认为我们有一条清晰的道路。我们正在研发下一代产品，预计明年将应用于人体，而在未来五年内，我认为我们将能够非常接近原生视力。”当 Hodak 在离开 Neuralink 后于 2021 年创立 Science Corporation 时，该公司概述了开发先进神经工程和脑机接口技术的计划。但首先，该公司希望证明其方法有效并发展可持续的业务，这就是为什么它致力于为视障人士恢复视力的原因。

As for Science Corporation’s brain-computer interface technology, it has previously said that its sensor will be implanted inside the skull and rest on top of the brain, unlike a Neuralink device, which is inserted directly into brain tissue. The company has said it believes the device could help address neurological conditions, such as possibly monitoring neurological activity in patients with brain tumors.

至于 Science Corporation 的脑机接口技术，该公司此前曾表示，其传感器将植入颅骨内并置于大脑顶部，这与直接插入脑组织的 Neuralink 设备不同。该公司表示，相信该设备有助于解决神经系统疾病，例如可能监测脑肿瘤患者的神经活动。

“In the near term, we’re going to be applying our first clinical indication, which hasn’t been announced publicly, is a neurodegenerative disease that everybody’s heard of,” Hodak said. “We’re also looking at stroke. For example, if you’ve lost part of your brain because it’s been dead due to stroke, if you can get connections into the deep brain in two different areas, you can imagine adding new cortical areas, just like adding new brain areas entirely — something simply not possible with conventional electrodes. But, I’d say longer term, the long-term mission of the company is to understand how the brain creates the mind and to learn to build engineered brains.”

“在短期内，我们将应用我们的第一个临床适应症，虽然尚未公开宣布，但那是一种每个人都听说过的神经退行性疾病，”Hodak 说。“我们也在研究中风。例如，如果你因为中风导致部分大脑死亡，如果你能在两个不同区域建立与深层大脑的连接，你可以想象增加新的皮层区域，就像完全增加新的大脑区域一样——这在传统电极下是根本不可能的。但是，我认为从长远来看，公司的长期使命是了解大脑如何创造思维，并学习构建工程化大脑。”

Hodak went on to note that Science Corporation’s belief is that many people will eventually use some kind of BCI. While the company isn’t designing for “healthy 40-year-olds,” he said, it believes people will eventually need some kind of BCI by the age of 60 or 70. “We want to figure out how do we extend not just lifespan but health span,” Hodak said.

Hodak 接着指出，Science Corporation 相信许多人最终都会使用某种脑机接口。他说，虽然公司不是为“健康的 40 岁人群”设计的，但它相信人们最终会在 60 或 70 岁时需要某种脑机接口。“我们想弄清楚如何不仅延长寿命，还要延长健康寿命，”Hodak 说。