Musk's Neuralink Probed Over Potential Hazardous Pathogens

The US Department of Transportation (DOT) is investigating Elon Musk's brain-chip startup, Neuralink, over concerns the company may have transported hazardous pathogens.

A DOT spokesperson confirmed to Insider that the agency was looking into the issue on Thursday after an animal right group had sent a letter to Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg. Reuters was the first to report the probe.

"We have received the request from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, and we take these allegations very seriously," the spokesperson said. "We are conducting an investigation to ensure that Neuralink is in full compliance with federal regulations and keeping their workers and the public safe from potentially dangerous pathogens."

The group, the Physicians Committe of Responsible Medicine (PCRM) said in a press release on Thursday that it had emails and other records that pointed to the possibility that the company had not properly packaged the brain implants from its test monkeys ahead of transportation in compliance with Federal Hazmat Law.

PCRM said the documents showed that pathogens, like antibiotic-resistant Staphylococcus and Klebsiella, as well as Herpes B virus, had potentially been transported in 2019 without meeting DOT guidelines, including proper sanitization and packaging.

PCRM cited an alleged email from 2019 in which a UC Davis employee said they were "concerned for human safety" at the site due to the risk of contaminated material. The group said contaminated hardware could cause issues in humans, including blood infections, pneumonia, and meningitis.

A spokesperson for Neuralink did not respond to a request for comment from Insider ahead of publication.

The documents are from when Neuralink was working with University of California, Davis. The partnership ended in 2020, but PCRM told Reuters that Musk's company still employs many of the same staff, including the neurosurgeon in charge of the experiments on the animal test subjects.

A spokesperson for UC Davis told Insider that the institution complies with lab safety and biohazard regulations.

The animal rights group has taken issue with Neuralink in the past. Last year, Insider reported that the group had sued UC Davis and filed a complaint with the US Department of Agriculture over Neuralink's treatment of its monkeys. PCRM said at the time that it had obtained records showing the monkeys experienced "extreme suffering as a result of inadequate animal care and the highly invasive experimental head implants during the experiments."

Neuralink previously denied some of the injuries cited by the group and said the company is "absolutely committed to working with animals in the most humane and ethical way possible."

Musk cofounded Neuralink in 2016 as a brain-computer interface company. The billionaire has said in the past that Neuralink's chips — which are coin-sized devices designed to be implanted in the brain via a surgical robot — could one day do anything from cure paralysis to give people telepathic powers, referring to the device as "a Fitbit in your skull."

The device has yet to receive approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

February 10, 2023