Mark Gasson
Mark Gasson | |
---|---|
Born | Mark N. Gasson West Sussex, England[citation needed] |
Alma mater | University of Reading (BSc, PhD) |
Scientific career | |
Fields | |
Thesis | Extending human interaction via invasive neural implants (2005) |
Doctoral advisor | Kevin Warwick[1] |
Mark N. Gasson
Gasson has featured on television documentaries including
He is currently based in Los Angeles, California.[citation needed]
Early life and education
Gasson obtained his first degree in Cybernetics and Control Engineering in 1998 from the Department of Cybernetics at Reading.[12] He obtained his Ph.D. for 2002 work on interfacing the nervous system of a human to a computer system in 2005.[1][13]
Career
From 2000 until 2005 Gasson headed research to invasively interface the nervous system of a human to a computer. In 2002 a
During clinical evaluation of the implant, the nervous system of the human subject,
As of 2005, this was the first study[citation needed] in which this type of implant had been used with a human subject and Gasson was subsequently awarded a PhD for this work.[13]
Invasive brain interfaces (2005)
Gasson and his colleagues, together with neurosurgeon Tipu Aziz and his team at John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, and physiologist John Stein of the University of Oxford, have been working on Deep brain stimulation for movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease.[5]
In order to improve control of abnormal spontaneous electrical activity in the brains of patients with movement disorders, as of 2010 they have been developing a combined deep brain recording and stimulating device that will record deep brain signals and from these predict the onset of symptoms such as tremor and dystonic bursts and deliver a short pulse of high frequency stimulation to stop the symptoms before they have even started.[17]
The Future of Identity (2004–2009)
From 2004 to 2009 Gasson headed a group of academics and industry professionals drawn from 24 institutions across Europe as part of the
First human infected with computer virus (2009)
In March 2009 Gasson had a glass capsule
In April 2010 following experiments showing the potential vulnerabilities of implantable technology, Gasson's team demonstrated how a computer virus could wirelessly infect his implant and then be transmitted on to other systems.
In 2010 Gasson was the General chair
Research
Gasson is a proponent of human enhancement using technology implanted into the body, and argues that advanced medical device technology will inevitably drift to non-medical augmentation applications in humans.[22] He also strongly argues that with technology implanted in humans, the separation between man and machine can become theoretical because the technology can be perceived by the human as being a part of their body. Because of this he reasons that, as the boundaries of the human body (the human experience of the body's delimitation) become increasingly unclear, it should be accepted that the technology augmentation is a part of the body.[21]
Gasson is an advocate of interdisciplinary collaboration and co-authors with social scientists, philosophers, legal researchers and ethicists to consider the wider implications of his field.[2][23]
Controversy
The research attracted criticism from computer security blogger Graham Cluley who stated [when?] "Predictions of pacemakers and cochlear implants being hit by virus infections is the very worst kind of scaremongering".[24] In 2012 academic Prof Kevin Fu of the University of Massachusetts Amherst disclosed an attack which "would have switched off a heart defibrillator" adding "there are vulnerabilities [in medical devices] but there is a perceived lack of threats".[25] Similarly Barnaby Jack a researcher at security firm McAfee demonstrated an attack on an implantable insulin pump.[26]
Some critics have questioned the need to implant the technology to investigate the issues "...it makes no difference if an RFID chip is injected under your skin or stitched into the lining of your jacket...".[24] Gasson argued that many people with implants, including medical devices, consider them to be a part of their body and so it is evident that you cannot simply separate the human and the technology that easily - "actually having something implanted is extremely different to bench testing a piece of hardware because it adds the person and their experiences into the mix. It is seemingly difficult to get across the psychological impact involved in this type of deployment, and this is why I was so keen to test this on myself ... feeling technology to be a part of you is something you probably need to experience to understand".[27]
References
- ^ a b Mark Gasson at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- ^ a b "University of Reading". University of Reading.
- ^ "University of Reading". University of Reading.
- S2CID 108963531.
- ^ a b Gasson, M.N., Wang, S.Y., Aziz, T.Z., Stein, J.F. and Warwick, K.: "Towards a Demand Driven Deep-Brain Stimulator for the Treatment of Movement Disorders", 3rd IEE International Seminar on Medical Applications of Signal Processing (MASP 2005), 3–4 November, London, UK, pp. 83-86.
- ^ Cellan-Jones, Rory (27 May 2010). "First human 'infected with computer virus'". BBC News online. BBC. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
- ^ Dr Mark Gasson - Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman, retrieved 15 December 2022
- ^ "7.30 Report - 15-Jun-2010". www.abc.net.au.
- YouTube
- ^ a b "General (conference) chair duties - Admin Wiki". aclweb.org.
- ^ )
- ^ a b "FIDIS urges mobile users to be aware of data disclosure" (PDF). FIDIS. 6 May 2009. p. 5.
- ^ a b Gasson, Mark (2005). Extending human interaction via invasive neural implants (PhD thesis). University of Reading.
- PMID 14568806.
- S2CID 25108318.
- .
- .
- ^ (DR), FIDISCoord. "Deliverables: Future of IDentity in the Information Society". www.fidis.net.
- ^ Scott, Richard (15 May 2009). "Phone firm customers warned over data". BBC News.
- ISBN 978-0-387-72366-2.
- ^ S2CID 3098538.
- ISBN 978-90-6704-869-9.
- ^ Mark Gasson's publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
- ^ a b "Bad science: Human computer virus experiment is scaremongering, says Sophos". www.sophos.com.
- ^ Ward, Mark (10 April 2012). "Fears over future medical hacks". BBC News.
- ^ Ward, Mark (10 April 2012). "Warnings on medical implant hacks". BBC News.
- ^ "Could you become infected with a Computer Virus?". www.personal.reading.ac.uk.
External links
Media related to Mark Gasson at Wikimedia Commons