No replacement for a lost body part is going to be as good as the original (at least not yet), but in unusual cases, such as with professional drummer Jason Barnes, scientists can come pretty close. Jason lost his arm after an accident at his job and afterward found that, although he could still play his drums, it just wasn’t quite the same as before.
Jason had long dreamt of being accepted to the Atlanta Institute of Music and despite his unfortunate accident, refused to give up his dream of being a professional drummer. After talking to a few friends about his problem, he was put in touch with the Atlanta Institute of Music and Media who set to work on not only getting Jason back to drumming but amazingly, providing him a robotic arm that allows him to be an even better drummer with technical abilities unmatched by any other human drummer on earth. Jason is the world’s first human-cyborg drummer!
Jason’s drumming arm uses electrical signals from his bicep muscle to control a small motor that changes the tightness of the drumstick grip as well as how quickly it moves. In addition, a second computerized drumstick was added to the prosthetic providing him with two drumsticks with his right hand. That means Jason can drum with three drumsticks at once giving him abilities beyond your average “humanoid” drummer.
Check out the video of the world’s first human-cyborg drummer below.