Many years ago, I was trekking in a remote location deep in the mountains when I saw a man trekking with a prosthetic leg.  Far from any roads or infrastructure, we were responsible for carrying everything we needed on our own backs. So I remember being awestruck at his determination and grit.  Later I saw the same man sitting on a small rock wall.  He had taken off his prosthesis and was clearly in distress.  His leg was injured and bleeding where it seated into the socket of the prosthesis. Without a word of complaint, however, he wrapped a t-shirt around his leg, replaced the prosthesis and stoically continued up the mountain pass.

A desire to restore quality of life

While I never spoke to the man, to this day I am deeply affected by his spirit to press on.  I also was struck by the notion that we have amazing technology to assist those whose lives were unalterably changed by accident or disability.  External to the human body, we have created technological wonders to restore function and quality of life, but it was obvious that we were lacking in a natural, intuitive interface between the technology and ourselves. 

The loss of a hand, for example, is a deep-reaching wound on many levels. With our hands, we feel and touch the world around us, including holding our loved ones. We express and experience emotion with our hands.  When you lose this ability, it’s a tragedy that simply shouldn’t be.  

Our singular focus is to build a bi-directional interface

Thus began our dream at Biologic Input Output Systems.  Our singular focus is to build a bi-directional interface between the human peripheral nervous system and the most advanced robotics and computing devices.  Our Interface is designed to operate at the speed of thought and with little to no learning required. 

Our Interface, which is the culmination of decades of advanced research, is singular and unique.  It enables real-time proportional control and communication to a small number of cells on an on-going basis.  One net result, is a biologically realistic hand that receives and transmits signals to our brain.  In-effect, this embodies the prosthesis as our real limb and it becomes part of us.  Borrowing from the wisdom of one of the pioneers in our field, Gregory Clark, Ph.D., “Body image is a creation of our brains and not our body”. 

Opens worlds of possibilities

Looking forward, and beyond prosthetics, we realize the implications of our technology are groundbreaking in a profound way.  To interface, in a biologically natural way with any advanced technology, opens worlds of possibilities beyond which we can only barely imagine.