Keith Thomas dove into a pool in the summer of 2020 and never imagined it would be the last time he felt anything with his hands.
The impact broke his neck and left him paralyzed from the chest down in Massapequa, New York. For months, he could move his arms only about an inch. Three months after the accident, the team of Professor Chad Bouton from the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research contacted him about a three-year trial that sounded like science fiction: a double neural bypass, a 15-hour surgery that implanted five microchips in his brain to reconnect his intention to move with his arms and hands, and sensors in his fingers that restore to his brain the sensation of what he touches.
Today Keith can eat on his own, drink a glass of water and, above all, pet Bow, his family’s dog, and feel his sister’s embrace again. According to results published in Nature Medicine, the strength in his right arm increased 86% after 35 weeks of training, and some sensations already persist even with the device turned off. His story was inducted into TIME’s Best Inventions Hall of Fame, but for him the real prize has four legs and wags its tail.