Sep 24, 2015 11:44 AM EDT By Staff Reporter, UniversityHerald Reporter

A paralyzed man's ability to walk has been restored using his brain power, The Guardian reported.

Researchers from the University of California at Irvine found that it is possible to use direct brain control to get a person's legs to walk again. This is the first time that a person with complete paralysis in both legs (paraplegia) due to spinal cord injury was able to walk without relying on manually controlled robotic limbs, as with previous walking aid devices.

"Even after years of paralysis the brain can still generate robust brain waves that can be harnessed to enable basic walking. We showed that you can restore intuitive, brain-controlled walking after a complete spinal cord injury," Dr. An Do, one of the lead researchers involved in the study, said in a statement. "This noninvasive system for leg muscle stimulation is a promising method and is an advance of our current brain-controlled systems that use virtual reality or a robotic exoskeleton."

The participant, who had been paralyzed for five years, walked along a 3.66m long course using an electroencephalogram (EEG) based system, CBS News reported. The system takes electrical signals from the participant's brain, which then travels down to electrodes placed around his knees to create movement.

Mental training was initially needed to reactivate the brain's walking ability. Seated and wearing an EEG cap to read his brainwaves, the participant trained to control an avatar in a virtual reality environment. He also required physical training to recondition and strengthen his leg muscles.

This proof-of-concept study involved a single patient so further studies are needed to establish whether these results are true for a larger population of individuals with paraplegia.

"Once we've confirmed the usability of this noninvasive system, we can look into invasive means, such as brain implants. We hope that an implant could achieve an even greater level of prosthesis control because brain waves are recorded with higher quality," said Dr. Zoran Nenadic, the senior lead researcher of the study.

The research is published in the open access Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation. 

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