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BrainPort Allows People To Reclaim Damaged Senses
Karma Star writes "There is a news article on a new device called a BrainPort, which is special device that
is worn like a helmet, with a strip of tape containing an array of 144 microelectrodes
hanging off the headset which is placed on the tongue. The BrainPort then sends signals
to the tongue which are then picked up by the brain, allowing the user to regain otherwise
lost sensory input.
More at the NY Times
(soul stealing subscription required)."
Can I use it to recover my sense of humour?
Can I wear it over my tin-foil hat?
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
Back when I was in highschool, I'd put a little piece of paper on my tounge and in about an hour I'd get the sensation of flight, could "see" sound, speak to animals and the like.
Plus, I didnt have to wear a helmet when I dropped acid.
Religion is for people afraid of going to hell.
This music tastes Great!
This story tastes delicious.
Karma: -2147483648 (Mostly affected by integer overflow)
What if you lost your sense of taste?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Their Product
Prior art?
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
The textual description of this... "The strip was wired to a kind of carpenter's level, which was mounted on a hard hat that she placed on her head...". for some reason, the image that unavoidably comes to mind is that of Doctor Who's classic Cybermen.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
A two-electrode version of this device exists in the form of licking 9V batteries, to give users the sense of whether 9V batteries are dead. It also works to test the main I hear...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
What if Im missing my sense of taste?
:)
Im sure having some gadget sticking in your mouth and a huge helmet on your head would make you a hit with the ladies too!
Seriously though.. I could see applications for this.
Picture this:
Fighter helmet with mouth piece that sits against the pilots tongue. When the computer detects a threat it can stimulate the pilots tongue in relation to the direction and distance of the target. After a little training this sort of thing would really increase reaction time.
Though it would make a conversation with the tower a bit tough
Less filling!
But you'll still be stuck in engineering while a guy with a positronic brain gets all the action.
sigs, as if you care.
Everything either feels, tastes, or smells like chicken.
For people buy into that paragraph bullshit.
New Tools to Help Patients Reclaim Damaged Senses
By SANDRA BLAKESLEE
Published: November 23, 2004
Cheryl Schiltz vividly recalls the morning she became a wobbler. Seven years ago, recovering from an infection after surgery with the aid of a common antibiotic, she climbed out of bed feeling pretty good.
"Then I literally fell to the floor," she said recently. "The whole world started wobbling. When I turned my head, the room tilted. My vision blurred. Even the air felt heavy."
The antibiotic, Ms. Schiltz learned, had damaged her vestibular system, the part of the brain that provides visual and gravitational stability. She was forced to quit her job and stay home, clinging to the walls to keep from toppling over.
But three years ago, Ms. Schiltz volunteered for an experimental treatment - a fat strip of tape, placed on her tongue, with an array of 144 microelectrodes about the size of a postage stamp. The strip was wired to a kind of carpenter's level, which was mounted on a hard hat that she placed on her head. The level determined her spatial coordinates and sent the information as tiny pulses to her tongue.
The apparatus, called a BrainPort, worked beautifully. By "buzzing" her tongue once a day for 20 minutes, keeping the pulses centered, she regained normal vestibular function and was able to balance.
Ms. Schiltz and other patients like her are the beneficiaries of an astonishing new technology that allows one set of sensory information to substitute for another in the brain.
Using novel electronic aids, vision can be represented on the skin, tongue or through the ears. If the sense of touch is gone from one part of the body, it can be routed to an area where touch sensations are intact. Pilots confused by foggy conditions, in which the horizon disappears, can right their aircraft by monitoring sensations on the tongue or trunk. Surgeons can feel on their tongues the tip of a probe inside a patient's body, enabling precise movements.
Sensory substitution is not new. Touch substitutes for vision when people read Braille. By tapping a cane, a blind person perceives a step, a curb or a puddle of water but is not aware of any sensation in the hand; feeling is experienced at the tip of the cane.
But the technology for swapping sensory information is largely the effort of Dr. Paul Bach-y-Rita, a neuroscientist in the University of Wisconsin Medical School's orthopedics and rehabilitation department. More than 30 years ago, Dr. Bach-y-Rita developed the first sensory substitution device, routing visual images, via a head-mounted camera, to electrodes taped to the skin on people's backs. The subjects, he found, could "see" large objects and flickering candles with their backs. The tongue, sensitive and easy to reach, turned out to be an even better place to deliver substitute senses, Dr. Bach-y-Rita said.
Until recently sensory substitution was confined to the laboratory. But electronic miniaturization and more powerful computer algorithms are making the technology less cumbersome. Next month, the first fully portable device will be tested in Dr. Bach-y-Rita's lab.
The BrainPort is nearing commercialization. Two years ago, the University of Wisconsin patented the concept and exclusively licensed it to Wicab Inc., a company formed by Dr. Bach-y-Rita to develop and market BrainPort devices. Robert Beckman, the company president, said units should be available a year from now.
Meanwhile, a handful of clinicians around the world who are using the BrainPort on an experimental basis are effusive about its promise.
"I have never seen any other device do what this one does," said Dr. F. Owen Black, an expert on vestibular disorders at the Legacy Clinical Research and Technology Center in Portland, Ore. "Our patients are begging us to continue using the device."
Dr. Maurice Ptito, a neuroscientist at University of Montreal School of Optometry, is conducting bra
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From the article:
Surgeons can feel on their tongues the tip of a probe inside a patient's body, enabling precise movements.
A whole new range of experiences for surgeons performing coloscopies, no doubt.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Fey work gweaf an I can feel ftuff I nefer fought I could!
LOAD "SIG",8,1
LOADING...
READY.
RUN
Here's a basic summary, in case the site gets slashdotted or in case you lost your senses of reading:
The method used is called sensory substitution.
That is, one sense can be used to emulate the input that is usually provided by another sense. The tongue is one of the best places for input.
You have to wear the substitution device for it to work, although it is speculated that by training the brain areas for the lost sense, the working of that area can be improved, so it just might help restore a sense in the situation where the organ not working is parts of the brain.
I'd like to add that I heard blind people can go mad when you try to feed them visual stimuli through the eye nerves, probably because these brain parts have taken on other roles. I'd therefore like to suggest that babies born blind are provided with artificial visual stimuli, so that this part of the brain learns to work and can later operate fully, when there is the technology to provide fully working artificial eyes.
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
It seems like a great breakthrough for the poor woman who lost her sense of balance, but the suggested uses?
Pilots confused by foggy conditions, in which the horizon disappears, can right their aircraft by monitoring sensations on the tongue or trunk. Surgeons can feel on their tongues the tip of a probe inside a patient's body, enabling precise movements
Sounds to me like an able bodied pilot or surgeon could just use the senses they already use. The pilot could still use the visual readout of the artificial horizon for example.
Is this really destined for common usage?
That someone is going to apply this to their nether-regions, if they haven't already.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
"It tastes like ... burning"
---
"I did nothing. I did absolutely nothing and it was everything that I thought it could be."
Older version of tongue interface.
University of Montreal news release
But wait, there's more cooler brain interfacing going on! Mystic Visions
I see, in the very near future, big wads of $100 bills moving into my pocket from users of the APE(TM) helmet. A Psychedelic Experience! Users don the APE helmet and the core moderating frequencies of the brain are modulated to produce everything from the mystic experience (sans the nasty side effects of peyote, psylocibin, or X) to a full blown emulation of a trip on the finest of Dr. Hofmann's concotions.
Franchise options available NOW!
Now I'm the grandest Tiger in the Jungle!
I hope that this leads the way to sensory prosthetics. People are looking into ways to directly control prosthetics using signals from the brain, but a major difficulty for people with prosthetics is how to use a limb that has no sensory output whatsoever. Anyone who has ever had their leg "fall asleep" on them, and tried to walk it off will begin to appreciate the difficulties involved.
By tapping a cane, a blind person perceives a step, a curb or a puddle of water but is not aware of any sensation in the hand; feeling is experienced at the tip of the cane. IME, the reverse is also true - when riding my motorbike, I'm not aware of pushing on the handlebars, shifting weight etc - I just think where I want it to go and it does.
Something about the size of a postage stamp, put on the tounge, and it brgins back lost sensations? I think Timothy Leary was heading down this very path a few years back...
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
The writers from The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension should sue for stolen IP. Lizardo was using that thing 20 years ago.
Similar to changing gears in a car. You don't sit there and think okay, the car is now in third gear, I must engage the clutch and then switch to fourth gear. The conscious mental process is just "upshift" and the body does the rest (or at least subcounscious portions of the nervous system.)
Same thing with writing and typing. I usually don't even think of the individual letters that I need to put down. I don't even deliberate over the words that I use. I just kinda think of the topic, and then my fingers move. When I want, I can then enact tighter control by switching my focus.
In fact, when typing, I usually don't even notice the keyboard, or most of the OS. Right now I guess I am thinking about interacting with this little box, not even noticing the rest of the page.
I'll never make that mistake again, reading the experts' opinions. - Feynman
cheap labor conservatives - they want to keep you hungry enough to be thankful for minimum wage.
Kevin Warwick (aka Captain Cyborg) gave a guest lecture at my university about 3 weeks ago. In it he discussed the implant he had placed on to a nerve in his arm, and the attempts he made to link electronic devices to his nervous system.
One interesting (at least to me) part was an experiment where he linked an ultrasonic distance sensor (worn on a hat) to his arm. As something got closer, the pulses became more rapid.
With his eyes open, he could sense the pulses, but not really make sense of them. When he was wearing a blindfold, someone moved quickly towards him. Instinctively, he stepped back out of their way.
It goes to show just how quickly the brain can learn to adapt, and potentially this could have a huge future if it's successful. I have to admit I don't see the point in using the tongue, but Warwick's method of using an implant and a nerve now definitely merits more investigation.
PocketGamer.org - For the gamer on the go!
Inhibit...no.
Overdeveloping happens when you adjust to the conditions around you so that you can continue to function.
If this doesn't actually provide better real sensory input, they'd still develop other abilities to compensate. If it does, then they don't need them.
I suppose you could say, "but then what would they do without the machine?" Well, a lot of people can't see without glasses. Should they be forced to not wear them so that their other senses can develop more fully? It seems always better to give people more opportunity.
Also, the ability to interpret sensory input is based upon practice. Because I worked at it, I can hear a lot better than most people - even than most blind people, I think. There's no reason that anyone can't have overdeveloped senses, but it takes work, and it's not worth it for most people.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
In recent years, science fiction has suffered a great decline in quality of content, in no small part due to the excessive commercialization of unimaginative "world of..." series.
So science has had to look to other forms of art for inspiration and development of new technologies. Scientists at Brain-Port Inc have found their new beacon of innovation in that aging rocker, Ozzy Osbourne.
During the development of the Brain-Port tonque interface, it was code-named the "Fly High Helmet" after Ozzy's song, "Fly High Again" in which he asked the question -- "Swallowing colors of the sound I hear, am I just a crazy guy?"
Brain-Port is rumoured to be working on another product which they are calling the "Hagar Helmet." Expected to be a huge boon to the auto insurance industry, the Hagar Helmet is designed to prevent the wearer from exceeding the speed limit. The exact mechanism by which it ensures that the wearer can only drive 55 is considered one of Brain-Port's most valuable trade secrets.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Maybe this is great work, but it bothers me that the professor can spin off a company to market this product which the university has patented.
Bear in mind that the good professor was supported by public money to do this research and the Univ. of Wisconsin similarly is state funded.
It seems just plain obvious to me that this research belongs to those who paid for it -- the public.
The idea that a university takes public money to use as venture capital with intent to profit is repulsive. Of course, it happens all the time in those branches of academe which connect to marketable products. But that doesn't make it right.
The book goes into very great detail, but it presents a model of the neocortex fairly different from that of other models, while at the same time building upon earlier work (like neural networks). Hawkins isn't proposing to build a human mind, but rather an "artificial neocortex". He deliberately ignores (though while acknowledges them) the effects other areas of the brain has on the neocortex (I don't think it is because he thinks they don't have anything to do with thinking, or that they aren't needed - I think he simply wants to understand and be able to use the neocortex for machine thinking, which would be radically different from human). His model, while different in subtle ways, seems similar to experiments and devices Igor Aleksander has built (interestingly, you don't here much about this individual - he isn't presented in Hawkins' book, and other AI books I have read don't mention his work, either - I tend to wonder if these two individuals will go down like Charles Babbage did - thier work highly relevant, perhaps even precient - but not used because they became obscure - for instance, when ENIAC was designed and built, none of the people involved had heard of Babbage!).
What is really crazy, and I hesitate to link it, because this individual is known as an extreme crank in AI circles - alright, those of you who know who I am talking about will know who I mean, so I won't mention him by name or moniker - is that Hawkins' ideas and model seem to be very similar (though developed in a different way) to that other individual's model. While Mr. M's model is convoluted, and serial like (with attendent streams of information flowing facilitating recall of thoughts/ideas/abstractions) - Mr. Hawkin's model of the neocortex is very similar in scope - only doing the same type of learning and recall using strict hierarchical, interrelated networks of neurons.
He comes away showing how, in the neocortex, all patterns are the same, in that for instance, knowing how a sentence is written or spoken activates the same patterns. These patterns, while they are learned, and later played back - cause other patterns to fire off and playback (or be learned, if only slightly) - which is why a song or the taste of a certain food, sometimes brings back certain feelings and thoughts - because the playback of what the pattern of the taste of the food causes the same/similar triggers to cause playback of the patterns for those thoughts and feelings. The concept of feedback in learning is the important part...
I encourage *everyone interested in this kind of computing* to pick up Hawkins' book, as well as Aleksander's book (and, I would implore you to (re)read Mr. M's ideas with a fresh mind, in the context of the models presented by Hawkins and Aleksander, and see if you don't agree that all seem to be studying similar paths in the same goal of what creates consciousness and intelligence - you may come back surprised)...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
Will the brain be able to interpret the forward and rearward vision simultaneously? Would a person be able to develop 360' vision? Even if not, I'd still like to have my own "rear view mirror" :)
There could be a huge market in wedgie prevention. :)
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
There's more to the brainport than sensory substitution. By using an alternate pathway (ie, the tongue) for a damaged sensory input (ie, vestibular organ & balance), it provides a connection for the brain to strengthen the few neurons that still remain. End result: it can possibly restore the damaged sense.
This is why the lady who lost her sense of balance was able to go outside & dance around WITHOUT THE HELMET after the initial trial. Dr. Bach-y-Rita has a promo video showing this; I couldn't find any link. It is also why there is hope of using this for rehabilitative therapy.
When I heard him lecture, my thoughts went something like this: Sweet!! I can use it to develope synesthesia without dropping acid!
I recently sustained a massive head injury. I passed out and fell backwards out of a chair. The impact cracked my skull causing a hemorrhage on my brain and blew out my eardrum. My brain to sloshed around in my skull, pulling on the nerves that run to my nose's olfactory receptors. The resulting condition has been quite the experience for me. I haven't completely lost my sense of smell however it has shifted drastically. Almost nothing smells the same to me now. The best way to describe it is that certain layers in an odor don't hit my brain so I smell only parts of the whole odor. The most difficult thing to deal with is that I can no longer smell the smells that trigger past memories that are scent driven. I can't smell cut grass and I can't smell the scent of a woman. I'm wondering if anyone has experience with this type of nerve damage. I wonder if this type of treatment can help fix the damage to my nerves.
The nerve bundles do, according to my Neurologist, regenerate over time. "Time"being" being years and decades. Supplements of Zinc are thought to help.
In four years, I've gone from smelling the same thing (burning blood, oh so wonderful) to faintly sensing almost everything. Part of it is probably brain re-training, and part of it is nerve regeneration.
Unfortunately, I don't think that this technology will function in the manner you hope. The Glands of Bowman and olfactory bulb that function as our sense of smell are screamingly complicated electro-chemical analytic systems. You'd have to cart around a full chemical assay lab on your back to equal these amazing biological systems. I believe that our best hope is for superior nervous tissue regeneration, which currently has its best hopes in the highly politicized "Stem Cell" arena.
Good luck, I know what you're feeling, and 'smell ya later'.
I think this would be an real interesting approach to Augmented Reality (or Mixed Reality -- see http://www.augmented-reality.org and Google for information and resources).
Normally, cameras and monitors (goggles, etc) are used to blend additional information into what you would normally see. But using additional senses for it would be interesting, too. At least, I think it would.
Wonder if your brain would be able to take other additional non-visual inputs and kinda-sorta internally superimpose them onto your vision, or if things would get confused because you would have two different sets of sensory input trying to accomplish the same goal (both visual and tactile inputs for visual information, for example).
Either way, this whole thing sounds cool to me, and I would be really interested in seeing how far its use can go.
Peace!
-=- James.