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Adaptive Brain Interfaces (ABI) - Reading your Mind

November 16, 2000

In today's fast paced world, information and communication technologies are dramatically transforming industries, economies and the quality of our lives. Access to new emerging technologies can be taken for granted. Unfortunately, not everyone can enjoy the benefits provided by information and communication systems on equal terms. The European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) is co-ordinating a project called Adaptive Brain Interfaces (ABI) as part of European Union Information Technologies ESPRIT programme, with the central aim of extending the capabilities of physically-impaired people to access new services and opportunities provided for today's "information society".
Based at the JRC's Institute for Systems, Informatics and Safety, the ABI project has developed a portable brain-computer interface based on the analysis of electroencephalogram (EEG) signals.

How does it work?
The ABI project makes it possible for people to interact with computer-based systems through conscious control of their thoughts after a short training period.
A cap with a few integrated electrodes acquires brain signals that are pre-processed and sent to a notebook for further analysis, biofeedback and completion of the task required. The portable brain interface has an embedded neural network classifier that recognises what mental task the wearer is concentrating on. It does so by analysing continuous variations of EEG rhythms over several cortical areas of the brain. Each mental task is associated to a simple command such as "select right item". This enables people to communicate using their brain activity, as the interface only requires users to be conscious of their thoughts and to concentrate sufficiently on the mental expression of the commands required to carry out the desired task. So, by composing command sequences (thoughts), the user can read a web page, interact with games, turn on appliances, or even guide a wheelchair. For example, the interface can be used to select letters from a virtual keyboard on a computer screen and write a message. As the user concentrates on different mental tasks, the keyboard is successively split in smaller parts until a letter is selected.

State-of-the-art technology
The ABI project seeks to develop individual brain interfaces. The same system is not suitable for everybody, as no two people are identical, either physically or psychologically. This means that an interface will be most successful when it is adapted to its owner. The approach is based on a mutual learning process where the user and the ABI interface are coupled together and adapt to each other. The neural network learns user-specific EEG patterns that describe the mental tasks desired, while the user learns to think in a manner that enables the personal interface to better understand them. In other words, every single user chooses his/her most natural mental tasks to concentrate on (e.g. arithmetic, preparation of movements) and also the preferred strategies to undertake those tasks. Also, since the user and his/her personal ABI learn simultaneously from each other, people with no previous experience with brain interfaces can master use of the system quite rapidly. Interaction is as natural as possible as the user can make spontaneous and self-paced decisions without having to wait for, or respond to, external cues. The user can also concentrate on a wide range of mental tasks, from motor-related (e.g. imagination of physical movements) to cognitive tasks (e.g. completing mental operations involving awareness and judgement). The neural network has been specifically designed to cope with the challenging problem of recognising mental tasks from spontaneous on-line EEG signals. In addition, it rarely makes incorrect classifications (less than 5%).

Improving the quality of life
Although the immediate application of ABI is to help physically disabled or impaired people by increasing their independence and facilitating access to the Information Society, the benefits of such a system are extensive - anyone can use it for a myriad of purposes, e.g. health and safety concerns (e.g. monitoring a person's level of alertness). ABI could also contribute to the medical diagnosis of brain disorders, be used for teaching and research in universities (e.g. psychology departments), and provide new forms of education and entertainment.

ABI Project's Partners are:
Fase Sistemi, Rome, Italy (a SME company); Fondazione S. Lucia, Rome, Italy (a neurological rehabilitation clinic); and Lab. of Computational Engineering, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC)

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