The XWave is an EEG interface from PLX Devices (Sunnyvale, CA) that works with iPhones/iPads as a controller for games, meditation training, and potentially many other uses not invented yet. The actual EEG is NeuroSky‘s eSense dry sensor, which the company has been licensing to other companies in order to push the technology into consumer hands.
The plastic headband, which costs around $100, has a sensor that presses against the user’s forehead and communicates with a free XWave iPhone application that then shows your brain waves graphically on the iPhone screen. As you focus your mind on a task the graphics are changed — a ball may move higher for instance, or your state of relaxation may be indicated by changes in a pulsating color, which moves towards blue as you become more relaxed.
Brainwave detection is powered by an NeuroSky eSense dry sensor, which provides a brain-computer interface (BCI) to sense even faint electrical impulses in the brain and convert them to digital signals that are sent to the iPhone. Previous applications of the NeuroSky technology include computer games and toys. In XWave an algorithm is applied to the brain rhythms to convert them to graphical representations of attention and meditation values.
XWave enables you to manipulate a number of other iPhone graphical applications and objects in games using only your brain waves, providing your rating in attention or meditation is high enough. At present you cannot text or browse the web using XWave, but you can use the device to train your mind to relax and focus on command. The list of applications for the device is likely to grow rapidly.
The XWave is meant to be used for entertainment, but can be applied to any other practical use, perhaps even as a controller for an assistive device for the disabled.
Product page: XWave…
Flashbacks: Video: Neurosky EEG Game Controller in Action; Coming Up: EEG Joystick; New Gaming Input Device Reads Your Mind; Brainwave Athletic Trainer Uses EEG to Improve Your Golf Swing