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A quadriplegic volunteer for Elon Musk's UK Neuralink trial has said his new brain chip "feels magical", and has given him "a new piece of hope".
Sebastian Gomez-Pena, who is completely paralysed from the neck down, had the 8mm chip inserted into his brain in a five-hour operation. Mr Gomez-Pena is one of seven Brits taking part in Neuralink's new UK trial, which hopes to prove the safety and reliability of the devices.
The chip, which has been in development for the last 20 years, links Mr Gomez-Pena's thoughts to his laptop. This means he can move his cursor and click on content without moving his hands.
"This kind of technology kind of gives you a new piece of hope," he said.
"Everyone in my position tries to move some bit of their body to see if there is any form of recovery, but now when I think about moving my hand it's cool to see that… something actually happens," he added.
The Neuralink device connects to 1,024 electrodes in his brain and was fitted at University College London.
A Neuralink Robot, known as the R1, helped neurosurgeons to insert the device 4mm into his brain tissue.
Harith Akram, the surgeon leading the UK trial, called the chip "mindblowing". "You can see the level of control that he had," he explained.
"This technology is going to be a game-changer for patients with severe neurological disability."
"Those patients have very little really to improve their independence. Especially now that we live in a world where we are so dependent on technology."
Mr Gomez-Pena joins 21 volunteers with severe paralysis around the world to have had the chip implanted, as part of trials to prove that Neuralink's technology is safe and reliable in the long term. Some volunteers have developed the ability to type on a keyboard, and others can now feed themselves with a robotic arm.
Elon Musk, who co-founded Neuralink in 2016, hopes that chips will be implanted deeper into volunteers' brains so that they can inhabit humanoid robots built by Tesla.
"You should actually be able to have full body control and sensors from [Tesla's] Optimus robot. So you could basically inhabit an Optimus robot. It's not just the hand. It's the whole thing," said Mr Musk.
"It'd be kind of cool. The future is going to be weird. But kind of cool."