We collect cookies to analyze our website traffic and performance; we never collect any personal data. Cookie Policy
Accept
NEW YORK DAWN™NEW YORK DAWN™NEW YORK DAWN™
Notification Show More
Font ResizerAa
  • Home
  • Trending
  • New York
  • World
  • Politics
  • Business
    • Business
    • Economy
    • Real Estate
  • Crypto & NFTs
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Travel
    • Fashion
    • Art
  • Health
  • Sports
  • Entertainment
Reading: A stroke stole her capacity to talk—18 years later, scientists used AI to deliver it again
Share
Font ResizerAa
NEW YORK DAWN™NEW YORK DAWN™
Search
  • Home
  • Trending
  • New York
  • World
  • Politics
  • Business
    • Business
    • Economy
    • Real Estate
  • Crypto & NFTs
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Travel
    • Fashion
    • Art
  • Health
  • Sports
  • Entertainment
Follow US
NEW YORK DAWN™ > Blog > Health > A stroke stole her capacity to talk—18 years later, scientists used AI to deliver it again
A stroke stole her capacity to talk—18 years later, scientists used AI to deliver it again
Health

A stroke stole her capacity to talk—18 years later, scientists used AI to deliver it again

Last updated: August 17, 2025 7:19 pm
Editorial Board Published August 17, 2025
Share
SHARE

Ann Johnson grew to become paralyzed after a brainstem stroke in 2005, at age 30. Because the third participant in a scientific trial led by researchers at UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco, she heard her voice once more in 2022, the primary time in 18 years. Credit score: Noah Berger, 2023/College of California–Berkeley

Ann Johnson grew to become paralyzed after a brainstem stroke at age 30. As a participant in a scientific trial led by researchers at UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco, she lastly heard her voice once more.

At age 30, Ann Johnson had rather a lot occurring. She taught math and bodily schooling at a highschool in Saskatchewan, Canada, the place she additionally coached volleyball and basketball. She’d simply had a child a yr earlier together with her new husband, and had given a joyful 15-minute-long speech at their marriage ceremony.

But the whole lot modified one sunny day in 2005, when Johnson suffered a brainstem stroke whereas taking part in volleyball with buddies. The stroke prompted excessive paralysis, and she or he misplaced the flexibility to talk and transfer any muscle in her physique.

She had what’s generally referred to as locked-in syndrome, a uncommon situation when somebody has near-complete paralysis and no capacity to speak naturally. She would attempt to communicate, however her mouth would not transfer and no sound would come out. It is most frequently brought on by a stroke or the neurological dysfunction ALS.

Eighteen years glided by earlier than she heard her voice once more.

That second got here throughout a scientific trial being carried out by researchers at UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco attempting to revive individuals’s capacity to speak utilizing a brain-computer interface. The expertise, the researchers say, has monumental potential to make the workforce and the world extra accessible to individuals like Johnson.

Modeling the speech course of

In 2015, Gopala Anumanchipalli started working as a postdoctoral researcher with Edward Chang, a neurosurgeon at UCSF, to know how speech occurs within the mind. They needed to know what permits us to go from considering one thing to truly saying it out loud.

“We were able to get a good sense of the part of the brain that is actually responsible for speech production,” stated Anumanchipalli, now an assistant professor {of electrical} engineering and pc sciences at UC Berkeley.

From there, they found out the best way to computationally mannequin the method in order that they may synthesize from mind exercise what somebody is attempting to say.

Primarily, they pinned down the best way to go to the supply of information—the mind—after which bypass what’s damaged—the connection to the physique—and restore what’s misplaced. On this case, they’re utilizing a neuroprosthesis that is studying from the a part of the mind that processes speech.

They began the scientific trial in 2020, and Johnson joined because the third participant in 2022.

Though the inhabitants of people that lose their capacity to talk on this means is comparatively small, the researchers say, they’re among the many most susceptible by way of high quality of life.

Since her stroke, Johnson has regained some muscle management. She now has full neck motion, and she will snort and cry and smile. She communicates largely utilizing an eye-tracking system that enables her to pick out letters to spell phrases out on a pc display screen. It is a gradual course of; she will solely write about 14 phrases per minute, in comparison with conversational speech, which is nearer to 160 phrases per minute.

So when she lastly heard her ideas out loud for the primary time in almost 20 years, it was deeply emotional for her.

‘We did not need to learn her thoughts’

“What do you think of my artificial voice?” Johnson requested, sitting subsequent to her husband throughout the trial. “Tell me about yourself. I am doing well today.”

Ph.D. scholar Kaylo Littlejohn, a co-lead on the examine with Anumanchipalli and Chang, remembers the second properly. As a researcher within the Berkeley Speech Group, a part of the Berkeley AI Analysis Lab, he led the examine’s AI modeling efforts, coaching decoders in order that the mannequin precisely and successfully translated Johnson’s mind exercise.

To present Johnson an embodied expertise, researchers had her select from a collection of avatars, they usually used a recording of her marriage ceremony speech to recreate her voice. An implant plugged into a pc close by rested on prime of the area of her mind that processes speech, appearing as a sort of thought decoder. Then they confirmed her sentences and requested her to attempt to say them.

Credit score: College of California – Berkeley

“She can’t, because she has paralysis, but those signals are still being invoked from her brain, and the neural recording device is sensing those signals,” stated Littlejohn. The neural decoding machine then sends them to the pc the place the AI mannequin resides, the place they’re translated. “Just like how Siri translates your voice to text, this AI model translates the brain activity into the text or the audio or the facial animation,” he stated.

Whereas the mannequin can reliably sense the intention to talk after which translate what’s attempting to be stated, it will possibly’t learn an individual’s errant ideas. It solely works when somebody is making a concerted effort to say one thing.

“We didn’t want to read her mind,” stated Anumanchipalli. “We really wanted to give her the agency to do this. In some sessions where she’s doing nothing, we have the decoder running, and it does nothing because she’s not trying to say anything. Only when she’s attempting to say something do we hear a sound or action command.”

However how practical is it, actually? Does it sound and look identical to Johnson? Or is it extra rudimentary and robotic? The reply, at the least at this level, is someplace in between.

Plug-and-play neuroprostheses and digital clones

Whenever you watch a video of Johnson talking with the brain-computer interface from when she first joined the scientific trial, you possibly can hear her voice piecing collectively phrases in sing-songy tones, but it surely’s not seamless. There’s additionally an eight-second delay between the immediate and when the avatar speaks.

However this previous March, the staff printed new analysis in Nature Neuroscience that dramatically decreased this delay. In 2023, the decoder used sequence-to-sequence structure, which required {that a} person try a complete sentence earlier than the mannequin might convert the sentence to sound or motion. However now the decoder makes use of streaming structure, which permits the fashions to actively pay attention in and translate mind exercise to sound in actual time, with solely a couple of one-second delay.

Within the 2023 examine, the avatar strikes its mouth when Johnson is speaking, and makes little actions when she’s requested to make a face, like a smile or a frown. Though the avatar wasn’t used within the March examine, researchers imagine the streaming structure will work with the avatar, too.

The avatar appears to be like sort of like Johnson, but it surely’s not a robust resemblance. Within the close to future, although, Anumanchipalli stated it is potential there might be 3D photorealistic avatars.

Anumanchipalli stated it might occur in only a few years, however analysis must occur in a number of areas. “It’s not something that we have off-the-shelf models that we can use now,” he stated. “So development must happen in the science, in the technology, in the clinical translation, as well—all of them together to make this happen.”

‘Disabilities needn’t cease us or gradual us down’

She loved listening to her personal voice, she advised them, and the streaming synthesis method made her really feel in management. She additionally needs the implants to be wi-fi, as an alternative of plugged into a pc—one thing the analysis staff is engaged on.

“Thinking further in the future, how do you imagine it working?” I requested Anumanchipalli. “Do you imagine a person, in real time, communicating exactly what they want with people around them?”

“It’s hard to predict,” he stated, laughing. “However what I am seeing are improvements that allow us to let individuals have the very best quality of their lives. If meaning they’ve a digital model of themselves speaking for them, that is what they want to have the ability to do.

“We need to be able to have neuroprostheses be plug-and-play, so that it becomes a standard of care and not a research experiment,” he continued. “That’s where we need to be.”

Johnson hopes to someday change into a counselor in a bodily rehabilitation facility, ideally utilizing a neuroprosthesis to speak together with her shoppers. “I want patients there to see me and to know their lives are not over now,” she wrote in response to a query from a UCSF reporter. “I want to show them that disabilities don’t need to stop us or slow us down.”

Offered by
College of California – Berkeley

Quotation:
A stroke stole her capacity to talk—18 years later, scientists used AI to deliver it again (2025, August 17)
retrieved 17 August 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-08-stole-ability-years-scientists-ai.html

This doc is topic to copyright. Other than any honest dealing for the aim of personal examine or analysis, no
half could also be reproduced with out the written permission. The content material is supplied for info functions solely.

You Might Also Like

Researchers uncover a sort of fibroblast that will contribute to the formation and recurrence of overgrown scars

Prostate testing might not goal these most definitely to profit, warn specialists

Tens of hundreds of youngsters aged underneath 5 struggling acute malnutrition in Gaza, latest estimates counsel

Sooner lymph circulation within the legs is linked to a greater response to diuretics in acute coronary heart failure sufferers

Physicians examine Reddit to higher perceive self-management of inflammatory bowel illness

TAGGED:abilitybringScientistsspeak18stoleStrokeyears
Share This Article
Facebook Twitter Email Print

Follow US

Find US on Social Medias
FacebookLike
TwitterFollow
YoutubeSubscribe
TelegramFollow
Popular News
Johnny Depp v. Amber Heard: What We Know

Johnny Depp v. Amber Heard: What We Know

Editorial Board April 23, 2022
Dozens Killed and Hundreds Burned in Bangladesh Depot Disaster
In a First, South Korea Declares Nuclear Weapons a Policy Option
New research reveals how mind stimulation improves cognition, decision-making in psychological well being problems
Trump will not pressure Medicaid to cowl GLP-1s for weight problems: A couple of states are doing it anyway

You Might Also Like

Scientists are amassing toenail clippings to disclose radon publicity and lung most cancers danger
Health

Scientists are amassing toenail clippings to disclose radon publicity and lung most cancers danger

October 8, 2025
Quebecers’ playing habits shifted dramatically through the pandemic, analysis exhibits
Health

Quebecers’ playing habits shifted dramatically through the pandemic, analysis exhibits

October 8, 2025
Electroacupuncture accelerates postprostatectomy urinary continence restoration
Health

Electroacupuncture accelerates postprostatectomy urinary continence restoration

October 8, 2025
What makes an amazing coach?
Health

What makes an amazing coach?

October 8, 2025

Categories

  • Health
  • Sports
  • Politics
  • Entertainment
  • Technology
  • Art
  • World

About US

New York Dawn is a proud and integral publication of the Enspirers News Group, embodying the values of journalistic integrity and excellence.
Company
  • About Us
  • Newsroom Policies & Standards
  • Diversity & Inclusion
  • Careers
  • Media & Community Relations
  • Accessibility Statement
Contact Us
  • Contact Us
  • Contact Customer Care
  • Advertise
  • Licensing & Syndication
  • Request a Correction
  • Contact the Newsroom
  • Send a News Tip
  • Report a Vulnerability
Term of Use
  • Digital Products Terms of Sale
  • Terms of Service
  • Privacy Policy
  • Cookie Settings
  • Submissions & Discussion Policy
  • RSS Terms of Service
  • Ad Choices
© 2024 New York Dawn. All Rights Reserved.
Welcome Back!

Sign in to your account

Lost your password?