New technology allows paralysed woman to fly fighter jet in simulator

Thanks to a revolutionary new technology Jen Scheuermann, paralysed since 2003 due to a  genetic condition, can feed herself chocolate, give high fives and even fly a fighter jet.

The 55-year old quadriplegic woman owes her new found abilities to Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which carried out a two-year experiment in association with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

With Scheuermann's permission the agency surgically implanted pea-sized probes into her brain as it sought a way to turn her thought to actions.

The research team was able to successfully translate Scheuermann's brain signals to a robotic arm, which then moved a chocolate bar to her mouth and made gestures like a thumbs up.

The same technology also helped Scheuermann experience piloting a plane.

The research team allowed Scheuermann to connect to a flight simulator, where she flew an F-35 jet and Cessna airplane, with her thoughts alone.

According to commentators, while the results open up myriad possibilities for those who suffer from limited mobility, they also posed questions about whether the technology could be used for destructive purposes.

The two years of groundbreaking neurosignalling research involved Scheuermann first controlling a robotic arm but later researchers learned that she was able to control both her right-  and left-hand prosthetic arms with just the left motor cortex, which was typically responsible for controlling the right-hand side.

After that, Scheuermann decided she could take on a new challenge, according to Arati Prabhakar, DARPA director.

"Jan decided that she wanted to try flying a Joint Strike Fighter simulator," Prabhakar told New America Foundation's Future of War forum. "So Jan got to fly in the simulator."

Unlike pilots who used the simulator technology for training, Scheuermann was not thinking about controlling the plane with a joystick, she thought about flying the plane itself - and it worked.

"In fact," Prabhakar noted, "for someone who's never flown - she's not a pilot in real life - she's in there flying a simulator directly from neurosignalling."

However, the research has also brought to the fore some potentially troubling ethical questions.

"In doing that work, we can now see the future where we can free the brain from the limitations of the human body," Prabhakar said.

"We can only imagine amazing good things and amazing potentially bad things that are on the other side of that door."