“Flappy experiments” by Elon Musk’s Neuralink allegedly “kept suffering animals alive for no reason and misconduct caused bleeding in monkey brains” during rushed brain chip tests, a former Neuralink employee and internal lab notes show.
The billionaire’s startup is accused of violating the Animal Welfare Act with its experiments at the University of California, Davis from 2017 to 2020, in which “all the animals involved were sacrificed,” said a former Neuralink employee who asked to remain anonymous to DailyMail. com.
One case in particular caught their eye – a monkey that was sacrificed prematurely because of alleged mistakes made during the operation.
previously obtained records from the Neuralink lab detailing how a sealant was applied to the surgical holes, causing the monkey’s brain to swell and bleed.
“There was no reason to use it,” the former employee, who worked as a necropsy technician, told .
“BioGlue has not been approved by the FDA for brain surgery and could never be transferred to human trials. I can’t see anything that isn’t approved for humans being used in primates.’
Neurosurgeon Matthew MacDougall developed the BioGlue and instructed staff to administer 15 to 20 milliliters when it should have been three to five, said the person familiar with the matter.
Handwritten lab notes show that MacDougall ordered the monkey to be allowed to live for days, even though the animal “regressed postopically and was “probably suffering from cerebral edema.”
This monkey is just one of many animals “sacrificed” during Neuralink’s experiments, which helped the company develop its brain chip, which Musk demonstrated last month and revealed it’s ready for human trials in the next six months should be.
Elon Musk’s Nueralink has come under fire over animal cruelty allegations during experiments at the University of California, Davis, where implants were placed in the monkey’s brain (pictured is a scan from the university showing the implant in an animal’s brain).
has reached out to Neuralink and MacDougall for comment.
Musk wants to develop a chip that would allow the brain to control complex electronic devices and would eventually allow people with paralysis to regain their motor function and treat brain diseases like Parkinson’s, dementia and Alzheimer’s. He also talks about merging the brain with artificial intelligence.
The billionaire hosted a Neuralink Show and Tell on November 30, revealing the brain chip used by monkeys to type on a screen using just their thoughts.
This effort was only made possible by tests conducted at the university, which resulted in the deaths of some animals.
In BioGlue’s case, the glue caused the brain to swell, which in turn puts pressure on the brainstem, the former employee said.
‘[The BioGlue] produced negative results, so the choice was to sacrifice the monkey and collect data,” the person continued.
The monkey that received an excessive dose of BioGlue underwent surgery on September 10, 2018. The lab notes state that a “cranial sealant was used to seal the burr hole” – the implantation site
The animal’s health deteriorated, but the neurosurgeon demanded that it be kept alive for another 24 hours. Pictured are Neuralink lab notes stating this
The autopsy notes any problems found in the euthanized monkey due to its deteriorating health. The former employee told that animals were also preserved while under anesthesia but were still alive
The autopsy shows the monkey’s heart was “slightly enlarged,” its esophagus was lined with ulcers, and its stomach contained a large amount of brown-black speckled fluid.
The area of the brain with BioGlue was “surrounded by hemorrhage.”
In Neuralink’s blog, the company admitted that there was “a surgical complication related to the use of the FDA-approved product (BioGlue)” and the monkey was euthanized.
However, the person involved in the experiments said that BioGlue is not FDA approved.
The former Neuralink employee told that this monkey and all the animals in the experimental program were euthanized and preserved while they were alive.
However, the person also noted that the teams “cared very deeply” about the animals that had to be sacrificed.
“Some were killed just before or immediately after the surgery to see what effect the surgery had on the animal,” the former Neuralink employee said.
“The first macaque was tested with a dummy implant to see how the implant would respond.”
The person went on to explain that Neuralink did “a lot of testing on rodents” in addition to sheep and pigs.
Elon Musk’s Nueralink announced this week that the chip will be tested on humans in at least six months. The goal is to use the chip to help people with their minds with paralysis control technologies
They also confirmed that MacDougall, who Neuralink hired in 2019, performed the experiments because they remembered “he had an RIFD.” [Radio-frequency identification] Chip so he didn’t have to have a badge.’
In addition to the Neuralink issues, Merkley said there is an issue with how the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) conducts inspections at facilities like UC Davis, which can house up to 4,000 monkeys at a time.
“A person is there at most most of a working day,” he said.
“It’s impossible to inspect that many animals. That means they don’t go around and look closely at all the monkeys.
“The USDA rarely enforces the law with animals in laboratory experiments.”
The USDA declined to comment.
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine filed a lawsuit against the University of California, Davis, where the experiments took place, claiming it was required to release video footage and photos of the experiments under California’s Public Records Act. Shown is an image of a monkey featured on Neuralink’s website
The monkey that died due to the BioGlue is just one of at least a dozen used in the Neuralink experiments conducted at the University of California, Davis (UC Davis) from 2017 to 2020.
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) provided with the lab notes it received from UC Davis following a lawsuit filed against the university by PCRM in February.
NEURALINK: ELON MUSK’S COMPUTER-BRAIN INTERFACE GAME
Elon Musk’s Neuralink is working to connect the human brain to a machine interface by developing micron-sized devices.
Neuralink was registered as a “medical research company” in California in July 2016, and Musk has largely self-funded the company.
It will work on what Musk calls “neural lace” technology, which involves implanting tiny brain electrodes that will one day be able to upload and download thoughts.
The technology will initially be used to help people suffering from severe degenerative brain diseases such as ALS, but could find wider application in the coming years.
The lawsuit also seeks to obtain videos and photos of the experiments, which the PCRM said should be released because the records fall under California’s Public Records Act.
This law states that government records should be made available to the public upon request. Because UC Davis is a federally funded entity, PCRM believes Nueralink’s records are covered by the law.
On December 1, Neuralink granted its request to intervene in the case.
Mark Kennedy, PCRM’s vice president of legal affairs, who attended the hearing in December, told : “I suspect they fear the records will be released because the university wouldn’t make the same arguments [Nueralink] want.
“We are talking about work and activities at a large university. So it’s not like it’s a private activity. These are government funded and government paid employees.’
Nueralink submitted its responses against PCRM’s petition received by , which mainly states that the company does not have to admit or deny the allegations.
However, Neuralink “denies” claims that it depicts an image that it does not harm animals.
Joseph O’Dhoerty, Neuralink’s Next Generation Leader, who signed the response into Intervention, wrote: “On the contrary, Neuralink’s animal care program has an impeccable record and is notable for never having received a single citation from USDA inspections had received.”
United States Department of Agriculture [USDA] inspected in March 2022, with “no non-conforming items found during this inspection”.
While O’Dhoerty’s statement may be true today, the experiments were conducted years before the inspection.
Ryan Merkley, Director of Research Advocacy at PCRM, told : “If cerebral hemorrhage is allowed and not cited, there is something wrong with the Animal Welfare Act.
“The Neuralink experimenter asked the animal care staff to let the monkey live for a few more days, which should also constitute an injury.”
Merkley noted that Neuralink did not report the monkey that died due to the BioGlue.