Skip to main content

Scientists use magnetism 'mind control' to make a mouse move around

mind control magnetism mouse magneto
Image used with permission by copyright holder
An international group of scientists has demonstrated that it is possible to use the power of magnetism to control the movement of mice. Using a technique called magneto-thermal stimulation, the researchers were able to stimulate the brains of the mice to prompt them to run, turn around, and temporarily halt all motion.

“We have developed an interface capable of sending signals to individual neurons deep inside the brain,” Arnd Pralle, professor of physics in the University at Buffalo College of Arts and Sciences, told Digital Trends. “It requires sensitizing the target neuron to heat and attaching magnetic nanoparticles to these neurons. If an animal then enters an alternating magnetic field, the nanoparticles warm up, opening an ion-channel, and activating the neuron. After the initial delivery of the ion-channel and the nanoparticles — which is done through a needle about the size of a human hair — the method is noninvasive, meaning there are no wires or connectors going to the brain.”

It is this latter point that is most significant. Similar techniques have been previously demonstrated, using light instead of magnetism and heat to activate the brain cells. However, these approaches require the permanent presence of minute fiber optic cables in the brain. The use of magnetism instead allows neurons to be stimulated remotely.

Between this and other related projects — such as the various brainwave-reading technologies allowing people to control prosthetic limbs or drones with their mind — Pralle says that it’s an exciting time to be working in the field.

“We are living a decade of the brain distinctly different from the first decade of the brain, the 1990s,” Pralle said. “There are several tools, including the one developed by us, which enable researchers to map neurocircuitry with emotions and behaviors. Currently this permits scientists to being understanding how our brain compute information, and how responses are encoded by the circuits. We are just at the beginning of these discoveries, and it likely will take a least a decade or more to unravel brain circuitry. However, eventually magneto-thermal neurostimulation and silencing and similar techniques will provide direct brain interfaces for artificial senses; perturbation for deep depression and other mood disorders; and therapeutics for age-related or accident-caused neurodegenerative diseases.”

A paper describing the work was published in the open-source, peer-review journal e-Life.

Editors' Recommendations

Luke Dormehl
I'm a UK-based tech writer covering Cool Tech at Digital Trends. I've also written for Fast Company, Wired, the Guardian…
Digital Trends’ Top Tech of CES 2023 Awards
Best of CES 2023 Awards Our Top Tech from the Show Feature

Let there be no doubt: CES isn’t just alive in 2023; it’s thriving. Take one glance at the taxi gridlock outside the Las Vegas Convention Center and it’s evident that two quiet COVID years didn’t kill the world’s desire for an overcrowded in-person tech extravaganza -- they just built up a ravenous demand.

From VR to AI, eVTOLs and QD-OLED, the acronyms were flying and fresh technologies populated every corner of the show floor, and even the parking lot. So naturally, we poked, prodded, and tried on everything we could. They weren’t all revolutionary. But they didn’t have to be. We’ve watched enough waves of “game-changing” technologies that never quite arrive to know that sometimes it’s the little tweaks that really count.

Read more
Digital Trends’ Tech For Change CES 2023 Awards
Digital Trends CES 2023 Tech For Change Award Winners Feature

CES is more than just a neon-drenched show-and-tell session for the world’s biggest tech manufacturers. More and more, it’s also a place where companies showcase innovations that could truly make the world a better place — and at CES 2023, this type of tech was on full display. We saw everything from accessibility-minded PS5 controllers to pedal-powered smart desks. But of all the amazing innovations on display this year, these three impressed us the most:

Samsung's Relumino Mode
Across the globe, roughly 300 million people suffer from moderate to severe vision loss, and generally speaking, most TVs don’t take that into account. So in an effort to make television more accessible and enjoyable for those millions of people suffering from impaired vision, Samsung is adding a new picture mode to many of its new TVs.
[CES 2023] Relumino Mode: Innovation for every need | Samsung
Relumino Mode, as it’s called, works by adding a bunch of different visual filters to the picture simultaneously. Outlines of people and objects on screen are highlighted, the contrast and brightness of the overall picture are cranked up, and extra sharpness is applied to everything. The resulting video would likely look strange to people with normal vision, but for folks with low vision, it should look clearer and closer to "normal" than it otherwise would.
Excitingly, since Relumino Mode is ultimately just a clever software trick, this technology could theoretically be pushed out via a software update and installed on millions of existing Samsung TVs -- not just new and recently purchased ones.

Read more
AI turned Breaking Bad into an anime — and it’s terrifying
Split image of Breaking Bad anime characters.

These days, it seems like there's nothing AI programs can't do. Thanks to advancements in artificial intelligence, deepfakes have done digital "face-offs" with Hollywood celebrities in films and TV shows, VFX artists can de-age actors almost instantly, and ChatGPT has learned how to write big-budget screenplays in the blink of an eye. Pretty soon, AI will probably decide who wins at the Oscars.

Within the past year, AI has also been used to generate beautiful works of art in seconds, creating a viral new trend and causing a boon for fan artists everywhere. TikTok user @cyborgism recently broke the internet by posting a clip featuring many AI-generated pictures of Breaking Bad. The theme here is that the characters are depicted as anime characters straight out of the 1980s, and the result is concerning to say the least. Depending on your viewpoint, Breaking Bad AI (my unofficial name for it) shows how technology can either threaten the integrity of original works of art or nurture artistic expression.
What if AI created Breaking Bad as a 1980s anime?
Playing over Metro Boomin's rap remix of the famous "I am the one who knocks" monologue, the video features images of the cast that range from shockingly realistic to full-on exaggerated. The clip currently has over 65,000 likes on TikTok alone, and many other users have shared their thoughts on the art. One user wrote, "Regardless of the repercussions on the entertainment industry, I can't wait for AI to be advanced enough to animate the whole show like this."

Read more