Imagine wearing a device that can help your brain feel better, just like wearing a smartwatch or headphones! 🧠💡 A group of clever scientists from the Chinese mainland has made this possible. They’ve invented a lightweight, battery-powered brain stimulator that can be worn while you move around.
This device is called a wearable repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) device. That’s a big name, but here’s what it means: it uses magnetic pulses to gently stimulate your brain, which can help with things like depression, recovery after a stroke, or even addiction.
Before now, these brain-stimulating machines were huge—they weighed over 50 kilograms (that’s like carrying a big adult panda 🐼) and needed lots of electricity. That meant people could only use them in special clinics or hospitals.
But the new device invented by the team from the Institute of Automation under the Chinese Academy of Sciences weighs only 3 kilograms! That’s lighter than most laptops 💻. Plus, it uses much less power—only 10% of what the old machines needed.
Because it’s so light and portable, people can wear it while walking around. In tests, scientists found that when people walked while wearing the device, it helped them understand how moving their legs can boost brain activity related to their arms. Cool, right?
This breakthrough means that in the future, people might be able to use these brain devices at home or in their communities, making it much easier to get help for long-term conditions.
Liu Hao, a senior engineer at the Institute, says that someday these wearable devices could work together with other technologies that read brain signals. This means the device could understand what’s happening in your brain in real-time and adjust its stimulation to help even more.
Who knows? Maybe soon, brain-computer interfaces—where computers and brains talk to each other—could be part of everyday life! The possibilities are endless. 🌟
Reference(s):
Chinese team creates 3kg wearable brain stimulator for mental health
cgtn.com
