Shannon Stapleton/Reuters
Three amputees have become the first men to get bionic hands that can be controlled with their minds. The Austrians underwent "bionic reconstruction" to replace their injured hands, voluntarily amputating them. Then muscles and nerves from their legs were transplanted to their arms in order to control robotic prosthesis with brain signals. (Manual movements have previously controlled prosthetic hands.) "This is the first time we have bionically reconstructed a hand," said Dr. Oskar Aszmann of the Medical University of Vienna told the AP. "If I saw these kinds of patients five to seven years ago, I would have just shrugged my shoulders and said, 'there's nothing I can do for you.'" The three bionic hand cases were described in a report published in The Lancet online on Wednesday.