Uploaded June 2020 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
In today's world of wearables, we have begun to receive information about our bodies in real time, and with relative ease. What if we could take this a step further to not only track our health rate or burnt calories, but to understand organ function? Extreme Miniaturization Engineer Michel Maharbiz is actively working to make this a reality. As a co-inventor of "neural dust," Michel uses an ultrasonic interface of millimeter-scale implants to get a closer look at organs in real time. With a miniature lens into the body, we will be able to understand how our habits affect organ function on a daily basis. In doing so, we can build healthy habits, easily share our health status with providers, and make waves in the progress of preventative health care.
Using neural dust and extreme miniaturization techniques, Michel allows us to observe organs like never before. Watch his TEDMED 2020 Talk, "Using neural dust to eavesdrop on our organs," to learn how a tiny new window into the human body could redefine the future of human health.
In today's world of wearables, we have begun to receive information about our bodies in real time, and with relative ease. What if we could take this a step further to not only track our health rate or burnt calories, but to understand organ function? Extreme Miniaturization Engineer Michel Maharbiz is actively working to make this a reality. As a co-inventor of "neural dust," Michel uses an ultrasonic interface of millimeter-scale implants to get a closer look at organs in real time. With a miniature lens into the body, we will be able to understand how our habits affect organ function on a daily basis. In doing so, we can build healthy habits, easily share our health status with providers, and make waves in the progress of preventative health care.
Using neural dust and extreme miniaturization techniques, Michel allows us to observe organs like never before. Watch his TEDMED 2020 Talk, "Using neural dust to eavesdrop on our organs," to learn how a tiny new window into the human body could redefine the future of human health.










![The art and science of our digital selves
An artificial intelligence expert’s theory about a future world where we may need to download our consciousness to the datascape in order for us to survive led Marilène Oliver to ponder what a world like this would be like. She asked herself “If indeed we could download our consciousness to the datascape what would happen to the physical bodies left behind? Or, more worryingly, what kind of consciousness would we have if we had no body?”— it is through these questions that her work using digitized bodies emerged.
The epicenter of Marliène’s work truly is at the intersection of art and science. Her work, digitized bodies created from CT and MRI scans, offers a visual representation of a digitized future. As she explains, “For me, this material [CT scans and MRI scans] offers a fascinating preview of just where we may be headed as we delve deeper and deeper into the interface between human identity and machine created data”. Watch Marliène’s 2018 TEDMED Talk to learn more about her work. The art and science of our digital selves](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/GfqhUO1_u28/mqdefault.jpg)