Cleo Abram gets an up-close look at Neuralink's new R1 surgical robot
Science journalist Cleo Abram's new episode of her YouTube show Huge* If True, which she shared on X on Oct. 30, 2026, visits Neuralink in Austin, Texas and films its Next Gen R1 surgical robot, which the episode says was being shown publicly for the first time. Neuralink's N1 implant uses hundreds of ultra-thin, flexible threads that are too fine to handle by hand, so the company built a robot to insert them. In the episode, the semi-autonomous R1 uses cameras and sensors to map the brain's surface and update that map in real time to avoid small blood vessels, then a fine needle inserts the threads one at a time, about 1.5 seconds each. The demo shown is on a 3D-printed model head, not a patient. The episode also compares Neuralink with Synchron and Precision Neuroscience.
About the footage: Semi-autonomous, per the episode; the insertion shown is on a 3D-printed model head.
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