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Sending Messages With Your Brain Via EEG
An anonymous reader writes "From a University of Wisconsin-Madison announcement: 'In early April, Adam Wilson posted a status update on the social networking Web site Twitter — just by thinking about it. Just 23 characters long, his message, 'using EEG to send tweet,' demonstrates a natural, manageable way in which "locked-in" patients can couple brain-computer interface technologies with modern communication tools. A University of Wisconsin-Madison biomedical engineering doctoral student, Wilson is among a growing group of researchers worldwide who aim to perfect a communication system for users whose bodies do not work, but whose brains function normally.' A brief rundown of the system: Users focus on a monitor displaying a keyboard; the interface measures electrical impulses in the brain to print the chosen letters one by one. Wilson compares the learning curve to texting, calling it 'kind of a slow process at first.' But even practice doesn't bring it quite up to texting speed: 'I've seen people do up to eight characters per minute,' says Wilson. See video of the system in action."
Is this anything like TCMP?
I got a catholic block.
That a brain was involved in the process of Tweeting.
Think how much more Stephen Hawking could gives us with this device.
:-)
I know he's in the hossie at the moment and I hope he recovers fully, enough to try this device.
Send one to him. Now!
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
...can be found here:
http://nitrolab.engr.wisc.edu/
Carousel is a lie!
So, when the letter being focused on flashes, the EEG picks it up and figures out which row and column are desired...
So it wouldn't work very well for the blind and its not pulling the letters out of the brain, its just a more sophisticated eye tracking device, similar to the goggles in apache helicopters? Why not just fit patients with those for a faster input method?
Is it sad that I am more likely to recognize you and your posts by your sig than your name or UID?
d a m n t h i s t h i n g i s s l o w
"The interface consists, essentially, of a keyboard displayed on a computer screen. "The way this works is that all the letters come up, and each one of them flashes individually," says Williams. "And what your brain does is, if you're looking at the 'R' on the screen and all the other letters are flashing, nothing happens. But when the 'R' flashes, your brain says, 'Hey, wait a minute. Something's different about what I was just paying attention to.' And you see a momentary change in brain activity."
Their "cognitive click from flash recognition" interface sounds an awful lot like the retrace timing system used for the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NES_Zapper.
I'm curious what kind of language optimization has been added, if any. Do they use predictive text of some sort?
Also, it seems a waste to limit the input to a display of a static keyboard (other than ease of use for people who know where to look for certain letters.) Why not have a dynamic interface, something alongs the lines of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dasher/?
I wonder how fast he would be if he imagined a Dvorak keyboard.