Slashdot Mirror
Quadcopter Guided By Thought — Accurately
ananyo writes "A toy quadcopter can be steered through an obstacle course by thought alone. The aircraft's pilot operates it remotely using a cap of electrodes to detect brainwaves that are translated into commands. Ultimately, the developers of the mind-controlled copter hope to adapt their technology for directing artificial robotic limbs and other medical devices."
From the paper (PDF) abstract: "... we report a novel experiment of BCI controlling a robotic quadcopter in three-dimensional (3D) physical space using noninvasive scalp electroencephalogram (EEG) in human subjects. We then quantify the performance of this system using metrics suitable for asynchronous BCI. Lastly, we examine the impact that the operation of a real world device has on subjects’ control in comparison to a 2D virtual cursor task. Approach. ... Individual subjects were able to accurately acquire up to 90.5% of all valid targets presented while traveling at an average straight-line speed of 0.69 m s^(1)."
This also appears to be the first time a Brain-Computer Interface was used to operate a flying device in 3D space. Also, there are several additional videos showing people operating the quadcopter.
-nt-
..don't panic
Do what I say, not what I think!! (At least not that particular thought.)
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083943 :)
Really gotta get myself an EEG headset sometime...I wonder what other signals it could be tuned to pick up? What happens if you think about moving a nonexistant limb, would anything happen? That could free up your hands and feet and let you control other things with your mind.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Screw the drone, hook him up to Quake 3 and lets see him pull off some sweet strafejumps...that'll be a better benchmark :D
Also i'm thinking that perhaps they should focus more on feedback. If visual feedback is the only thing he gets, especially with the delay, it'll take him a lot longer than if he had say, rumblepack belts attached to him which gave feedback on direction, tilt, speed etc.
I can see this as a natural progression.
First we have direct brain control for very basic, then it gets more detailed. Finally we can get to less invasive methods of monitoring the brain activity.
Once we get that good, I could see getting more details for more finer type of movements. After we get a good map of the movement sectors of the brain, we may want to scan other sections such a vision we we can record what we see, or hearing. Perhaps we could scan our language processing areas and make real time interpreting software. Or allow us to send complex commands by though.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Personally I think the hand is still the best tool we have to do physical manipulation. That is what it was designed for and it is excellent. Since we don't use our 'minds' to move objects normally, I think the hand, or a hand-guided tool, will always be the best.
Now to hook this up to my flying car...
Slashdot - News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters, in ISO-8859-1 Has just realised that beta makes this signature redundant
All this is fine, but can they make a version controllable by cat's thought?
The roughly 500 msec phase delay from having to average the very noisy electrical signals detectable on the skin into a valid, usable motor controller was the failing point of the Boston Arm, and seems to be the problem of this system as well. It's just not going to be as quick as something that's tied directly to the physical neural structure and signal processing built into normal nerve-muscle interfaces, which are specific, complex, adaptive, and generated in a physical 3-D structure with its own processing capabilites.
But it's fun to play with my-electric or other skin sensor based systems.
As can be seen, the drone used is a Parrot.
The Parrot has pretty insane automatic correction so that it always stays stable and make smooth turns.
Try moving like that while controlling the drone directly.
Now make it available to "pilot" quadruplegic people.
The military already has basic mech-suits. Combine it with a functional BCI, and we've effectively made one of the most horrific of human injuries a mere nuisance.
That said, as an able-bodied person, I'll still gladly take a few BCI-enabled toys - When can I get one of these?
Wow this is impressive. Just what I needed for Christmas, a brain cancer. lol
because its not hard to see how a device used to read your brain signals could be modified to INSERT them too
Yes. Yes, it really is. This isn't the computer reading your mind, so much as it is your mind learning how to talk to the computer. There is a steep learning curve as your mind rewires itself to be able to produce the kinds of signals the EEG is set up to trigger off of. There is no way this could operate in reverse with our current level of technology and understanding.
They want their "Biofeedback" fad back.
Though it could have been newsworthy, if they used Raspberry Pi in 3D-printed box to implement the control algorithms.
The Modular Prosthetic Limb, developed by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory with funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency provides 26 degrees of motion, including independent movement of each finger, in a package that weighs about nine pounds and has the dexterity of a natural limb. In 2012, a patient at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center successfully demonstrated that the arm could be controlled by the user’s thoughts. Several patients, including a decorated Afghanistan war hero, are helping researchers further develop the prosthesis. In 2013, the MPL will continue to be tested and refined in a clinical trial at the California Institute of Technology.
"If thoughts could ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HWhen thoughts can kill" this may not be seen as such a great idea.
Oh, I'm sorry sir, I thought you were referring to me, Mr. Wensleydale.
Except for the obvious disabled folks can more stuff, why is thought control better then just using you thumbs on a joystick? Seems to me it's much harder to put on a scull cap, try to think of just one thing for a long time and so on verses picking up a controller and flying the thing. Or, do we intend to have an army amputees piloting drones in the future?
Far fewer idiotic public appearances by polititians and celebs - at least not without covering ack-ack.
The person doing the controlling and the robot don't need to be in the same location...it could be that a robot could effect repairs in space controlled by a person on the ground by thought, or a surgeon could similarly control a robot to work on battlefield casualties.
Once I was a four stone apology. Now I am two separate gorillas.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
The paper (PDF, 1.7MB)
... tomorrow it's Iron Man suits.
The future looks bright! And also a bit shiny.