People may lose their ability to speak due to a number of reasons. They could have been in an accident, or developed an illness. People suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or from a stroke may lose their power of speaking. Or it could happen due to any other reason, medical or trauma based.

Often when this happened it was no longer possible for them to communicate by talking out loud. Making a huge difference in their life and ability to function. Now a new technology based on Artificial Intelligence(AI) developed by researchers at the Columbia University may change things drastically for such people.

The AI based system monitors the brain activity of the person and helps to translate their thoughts directly into recognizable speech using speech synthesizers. It literally decodes the brain waves into thoughts that can be decoded and shared. Sounds like science fiction, doesn’t it? Luckily the technology has now come into existence.

This is not the first science project attempting to communicate directly with the brain, however it lays the foundation to help mute people communicate in ways they did not imagine before. In the future losing your ability to speak may not equal losing your voice as well. It would make a considerable change in the way such people are viewed by society as well as their ability to integrate into society as contributing members.