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Toyota Demonstrates Brain Control of Wheelchair

Posted by kdawson on from the left-no-left-dammit-left-puff-crash dept.

An anonymous reader tips us that researchers at Toyota have developed a brain-machine interface system that allows for control of a wheelchair using thought. The system processes brain thought patterns (such as the thought of moving one's left foot) and can turn them into left, right, and forward movements of the wheelchair with a delay as short as one-eighth of a second. That's a big improvement over existing systems, which can take as long as several seconds to analyze and react to the user's thoughts. "The system has an emergency stop that can be activated by the user puffing his cheeks. The BMI adjusts itself over time to the characteristics of each driver's brainwaves. If a person dedicates three hours a day to using the system, the BMI can reach 95% accuracy in a week, researchers said."

13 of 107 comments (clear)

  1. 95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But hitting that wall or doorjamb the other 5% of the time really sucks.

    1. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by Bob9113 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I was going to say just this. 95% sounds good until you start thinking about it - but that means that in every hour of usage, the chair is going to spend three full minutes misbehaving.

      OK, sure, but answer this: When you go out for an hour walk, do you ever stumble or overbalance? Sure, the wheelchair isn't perfect -- but neither are we.

      Three minutes? I'd guess this thing is about as effective at understanding the brain's motive commands as an average six year old. That's pretty good.

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    2. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by TapeCutter · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "I was going to say just this. 95% sounds good until you start thinking about it - but that means that in every hour of usage, the chair is going to spend three full minutes misbehaving. I can't find exact statistics or standards for conventional electric wheelchairs but I'd be amazed if the mean time before failure is measured in minutes rather than months or years."

      Depends how you define "failure". For the type of patient that need this interface the existing interface methods would have up to a 100% failue rate simply because their disability prevents them from using it with a reasonable degree of accuracy.

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    3. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by pinkushun · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That's 95% more than any paralyzed person can move. I'm sure this figure will improve too!

    4. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by nacturation · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I was going to say just this. 95% sounds good until you start thinking about it - but that means that in every hour of usage, the chair is going to spend three full minutes misbehaving.

      Depends on how it fails for that 5%. If 95% of the time, it understands and executes the command perfectly, but the other 5% of the time, it doesn't understand and thus executes no command, then that's pretty good.

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    5. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by SeaFox · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The statement was "If a person dedicates three hours a day to using the system, the BMI can reach 95% accuracy in a week", they didn't say that 95% was the highest accuracy one could obtain. After a full month of usage, you could find yourself at decimal point level inaccuracy.

    6. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by skaet · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Additionally, which 5% are we talking about? Does it fail every 57min for 3min reliably? Every 19min for 60sec? Every minute for 3sec? Or every 10sec for half a second?

      Breaking it down like that and what do you get? A very small delay between reaction times every few seconds. Perhaps not even a noticeable delay since their optimal response time is 0.125sec

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    7. Re:95% accuracy is pretty awesome. by BrightSpark · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The human being has a built in risk management system. I wouldn't like the 5% failure to happen say at the train platform or near a road crossing. We take special care and do a lot of subconscious checking in more dangerous situations. True we are not foolproof, but we have a lifetime of reasoning to fall back on. The wheelchair system is a bit like a child. Kids need extra help in similar conditions becasue their peripheral vision is not great, their sense of risk and reasoning is still developing. I'm sure these wheelchair owners would be making the same calls about some overide intervention at high risk times. Good idea though. I'd sure hate it if I were stuck in a wheelchair.

  2. Thought / Action Barrier by wasabu · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Uhmm.. what happens if you can't stop thinking about moving?

    1. Re:Thought / Action Barrier by interkin3tic · · Score: 4, Insightful

      There's a difference for most of us between thinking ABOUT moving our foot and thinking TO move our foot.

  3. Wheeee! by powerslave12r · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I can't wait to hook it up to a Wii and play some racing games.

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  4. Re:95% accuracy probably not good enough by Korin43 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That seems to be why there's an emergency stop built in..

  5. Re:That's nearly perfect. by JanneM · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "Oh, good, I stand a relatively good chance of being able to stop myself before rolling into traffic."

    Which is why the brake is controlled with the breathing tube.

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