A new study, which tries to merge artificial intelligence with targeted electrical brain stimulation, has proved that it is possible to improve specific human brain functions related to self-control and mental flexibility. The breakthrough finding also indicates that this method could be a new approach to treat a variety of severe mental illnesses. The pilot human study, published in Nature Biomedical Engineering, identified a brain region — the internal capsule — that improved patients’ mental function when stimulated with small amounts of electrical energy. This part of the brain is responsible for cognitive control — the process of shifting from one thought pattern or behavior to another, which is impaired in most mental illnesses, the researchers said in the report.

In this study, the team led by Dr Alik Widge, an assistant professor of psychiatry and member of the Medical Discovery Team on Addiction at the University of Minnesota Medical School, developed algorithms, which helps them track patients’ cognitive control abilities, both from their actions and directly from their brain activity, after stimulation. The controller method provided boosts of stimulation whenever the patients were doing worse on a laboratory test of cognitive control. This system can read brain activity, ‘decode’ from that when a patient is having difficulty, and apply a small burst of electrical stimulation to the brain to boost them past that difficulty, Dr Widge said in the report.