A couple years ago, surgeons in Pittsburgh implanted Jackson with an experimental brain-computer interface, or BCI. Made by New York–based startup Synchron, it decodes Jackson’s brain signals to carry out commands on the laptop and other devices. A neurodegenerative disease, ALS causes nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord to break down over time, resulting in a gradual loss of muscle control. While the implant wouldn’t slow the progression of Jackson’s ALS, it could give him back some of the autonomy he’d lost to the disease. Then they inserted a small rectangular device below Jackson’s collarbone, which processes the brain signals and beams them via infrared outside the body.