Severely disabled people may soon be able to use new technology to communicate with others and to control external devices simply by using their thoughts. Brain-computer interfaces have shown promise in the past in being able to interpret a user’s intentions, but they are limited by the size of the electrode array and so the number of neurons being sensed. These devices are therefore required to estimate the intended activity, necessarily producing errors and leading to poor control of whatever device is being manipulated.
Now researchers at Stanford University have come up with new mathematical model that, when applied to data coming from a brain-computer interface, significantly improves how the person’s intentions are interpreted. In a study on monkeys implanted with electrode arrays on their brains, the animals showed the ability to use their minds to control a cursor on the screen about as fast as doing single-key typing.
The study results have been published in journal Nature Communications describes how the researchers studied the natural motion of monkeys and the brain activity associated with those motions. They later had the monkeys play mind games on the computer, moving a cursor similar to how a physical object would be moved across the screen. The monkeys achieved impressive results that bode well for the future of clinical rehab for people with serious physical limitations.
Study in Nature Communications: Single-trial dynamics of motor cortex and their applications to brain-machine interfaces…
Source: Stanford…