Geoffrey S. F. Ling, M.D., Ph.D., is a medical doctor who retired from the United States Army as a Colonel. He served as the Founding Director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects AgencyBiological Technologies Office from 2014 until 2016. He was considered to be the "US Army's premier subject matter expert on traumatic brain injury ", and was for years the only neuro-intensive care specialist in the US military. Prominent in his DARPA research portfolio are Preventing Violent Explosive Neuro Trauma, prevention of explosive blast traumatic brain injury, Revolutionizing Prostheses, development of responsive, brain-controlled, artificial arms, Predicting Health and Disease, combination of biomarkers and advanced analytics to diagnosis of disease in the presymptomatic state and Battlefield Medicine, development of point-of-care drug manufacturing technology. He also served as a Program Manager and following, the Deputy Director of the Defense Sciences Office. Ling is recipient of the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service, Legion of Merit, Alpha Omega Alpha, Sigma Xi and the Humanitarian Award from the Brain Mapping Foundation.
Ling completed two war deployments as a neurointensive care physician: Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as four "Gray Team" tours to study combat brain injuries. His medical studies of the war in Afghanistan and Iraq show that over 50% of those who died of wounds had head injuries. Prior to his position as the founding Director of the Biological Technologies Office at DARPA, Ling was Professor and Acting Chair of the Department of Neurology at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. He has been on the USUHS faculty since 1995 and is now Emeritus Professor. For many years, he was the Army's only neuro-intensive care physician. Ling is also Professor of Neurology and Anesthesiology & Critical Care Medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital and was a member of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Ling served as an Army doctor for 27 years, and retired in 2012. Ling and his work have been featured twice on the TV show 60 Minutes, in 2009 and 2012.
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Ling is Professor of Neurology and Anesthesiology & Critical Care Medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital and was a member of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Ling and his work have been featured twice on the TV show 60 Minutes, in 2009 and 2012. He was also one of the doctors who treated American Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords after she had been shot in the head. Ling's publications include over 200 peer reviewed journal articles, research reviews, and book chapters with an artificial arm patient.
Prosthetic arm development
Because of engineering and medical concerns, arm replacement is more difficult than leg replacement. Arm replacement technology was far behind leg replacement technology when DARPA began the Revolutionizing Prosthetics team in 2006. In May 2014, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the first of the two prosthetic arms developed under that program. Earlier in 2014, DARPA's Biological Technologies Office announced the launch of a new Hand Proprioception and Touch Interfaces program, which aims to deliver naturalistic sensations to amputees and, in the process, enable intuitive, dexterous control of advanced prosthetic devices; provide the psychological benefit of improving prosthesis "embodiment"; and reduce phantom limb pain. Ling has described the problem of developing a high quality artificial arm as "doggone hard". Ling's Revolutionizing Prosthetics team's work could lead to the restoration of sight and hearing. Using his artificial arms, amputees could precisely move their artificial arms with just thought.
