Science fiction come true: Moving a paralyzed hand with the power of thought

The next day, doctors opened Burkhart’s skull. They crowned his head with a small metal cylinder, attached to bone by screws, and ran a wire between it and the chip they stuck like Velcro to his brain.

The wound healed nicely, though Burkhart’s head hurt a lot, especially when, in the days after the operation, his hospital wing decided it was a good time to test its fire alarms. Burkhart finished his finals at Ohio State University, where he had enrolled after the accident. He helped coach the lacrosse team at his old high school — where he had been a standout goalie — to the state finals.

Three times a week, he rolled his wheelchair up to a computer monitor and allowed scientists from Battelle, a nonprofit research organization that invented the technology they hoped would let him move his hand with his thoughts again, to plug into his brain. Together, they practiced. He would watch a digital hand move on the screen, and he would think about moving his hand the same way. The computer would read his thoughts and move a second, animated hand at his direction.