BRAIN COMPUTER INTERFACEBRAIN GATE SYSTEM

N.Yamini Snigdha
B.Tech IT
Adhiparasakthi Engineering College
Melmaruvathur
India
[email protected]
ABSTRACT:
The mind-to-movement system that
allows a quadriplegic man to control a computer
using only his thoughts is a scientific milestone. It
was reached, in large part, through the brain gate
system. This system has become a boon to the
paralyzed. The Brain Gate System is based on
Cyber
kinetics
platform
technology
to
sense,transmit,analyze and apply the language of
neurons. The principle of operation behind the
Brain Gate System is that with intact brain
function, brain signals are generated even though
they are not sent to the arms, hands and legs.The
signals are interpreted and translated into cursor
movements, offering the user an alternate Brain
Gate pathway to control a computer with
thought,just as individuals who have the ability to
move their hands, use a mouse.
Keywords-Brain Gate,Neuron,Muscle

I. INTRODUCTION
The 'Brain Gate' contains tiny spikes that
will extend down about one millimetre into the
brain after being implanted beneath the
skull,monitoring the activity from a small group of
neurons.It will now be possible for a patient with
spinal cord injury to produce brain signals that
relay the intention of moving the paralyzed
limbs,as signals to an implanted sensor,which is
then output as electronic impulses. These impulses
enable the user to operate mechanical devices with
the help of a computer cursor. Matthew Nagle,a 25year-old Massachusetts man with a severe spinal
cord injury,has been paralyzed from the neck down
since 2001.After taking part in a clinical trial of
this system,he has opened e-mail,switched TV
channels,turned on lights.He even moved a robotic
hand from his wheelchair.This marks the first time
that neural movement signals have been recorded
and decoded in a human with spinal cord
injury.The system is also the first to allow a human
to control his surrounding environment using his
mind.
II. HOW DOES THE BRAIN CONTROL
MOTOR FUNCTION?
The
brain
is
"hardwired"
with
connections, which are made by billions of neurons

S.Delfin
B.Tech IT
Adhiparasakthi Engineering College
Melmaruvathur
India
[email protected]
that make electricity whenever they are stimulated.
The electrical patterns are called brain waves.
Neurons act like the wires and gates in a computer,
gathering and transmitting electrochemical signals
over distances as far as several feet. The brain
encodes information not by relying on single
neurons, but by spreading it across large
populations of neurons, and by rapidly adapting to
new circumstances.
Motor neurons carry signals from the central
nervous system to the muscles, skin and glands of
the body, while sensory neurons carry signals from
those outer parts of the body to the central nervous
system. Receptors sense things like chemicals,
light, and sound and encode this information into
electrochemical signals transmitted by the sensory
neurons. And interneurons tie everything together
by connecting the various neurons within the brain
and spinal cord. The part of the brain that controls
motor skills is located at the ear of the frontal lobe.
III.HOW DOES THIS COMMUNICATION
HAPPEN?
Muscles in the body's limbs contain
embedded sensors called muscle spindles that
measure the length and speed of the muscles as
they stretch and contract as you move. Other
sensors in the skin respond to stretching and
pressure. Even if paralysis or disease damages the
part of the brain that processes movement, the
brain still makes neural signals. They're just not
being sent to the arms, hands and legs.
A technique called neurofeedback uses
connecting sensors on the scalp to translate brain
waves into information a person can learn from.
The sensors register different frequencies of the
signals produced in the brain. These changes in
brain wave patterns indicate whether someone is
concentrating or suppressing his impulses, or
whether he is relaxed or tense.
IV.NEUROPROSTHETIC DEVICE
A neuroprosthetic device known as
Braingate converts brain activity into computer
commands. A sensor is implanted on the brain, and
electrodes are hooked up to wires that travel to a
pedestal on the scalp. From there, a fiber optic
cable carries the brain activity data to a nearby
computer.

V.PRINCIPLE
"The principle operation of the BrainGate
Neural Interface System is that, with intact brain
function, neural signals are generated even though
they are not sent to the arms, hands and legs. These
signals are interpreted by the System and a cursor
is shown to the user on a computer screen that
provides an alternate "BrainGate pathway". The
user can use that cursor to control the computer,
just as a mouse is used."

According to the Cyberkinetics' website, three

patients have been implanted with the brain-gate
system. The company has confirmed that one
patient has a spinal cord injury, whilst another has
advanced one.
In addition to real-time analysis of neuron
patterns to relay movement, the brain-gate array is
also capable of recording electrical data for later
analysis. A potential use of this feature would be to
study seizure patterns in a patient with braingate,where current recruiting of patients with a
range of neuromuscular and neurodegenerative
conditions for pilot in the USA is done.

BrainGate is a system developed by the biotech company in conjunction with the Department
of Neuroscience . The device was designed to help
those who have lost control of their, or other bodily
functions, such as patients with ALS. It is a chip
which is implanted into the patient and converts the
intention of the user into computer commands.
VI.NEURO CHIP

VII.WORKING
Operation of the BCI system is not simply
listening the EEG of user in a way that lets tap this
EEG in and listen what happens. The user usually
generates some sort of mental activity pattern that
is later detected and classified.

Currently the chip uses 100 hair-thin spins

like structures which are implanted in specific
areas of the brain, for example, the area that
controls arm movement. The activity is translated
into electrically charged signals and are then sent
and decoded using a program, which can move
either a robotic arm or a computer cursor.

VIII.PREPROCESSING
The raw EEG signal requires some
preprocessing before the feature extraction. This
preprocessing includes removing unnecessary
frequency bands, averaging the current brain
activity level, transforming the measured scalp
potentials to cortex potentials and denoising
frequency bands of the EEG.
Tabulated frequencies:-

IX.DETECTION
The detection of the input from the user and
them translating it into an action could be
considered as key part of any BCI system. This
detection means to try to find out these mental
tasks from the EEG signal. It can be done in timedomain, e.g. by comparing amplitudes of the EEG
and in frequency-domain. This involves usually
digital signal processing for sampling and band
pass filtering the signal, then calculating these time
or frequency domain features and then classifying
them. These classification algorithms include
simple comparison of amplitudes linear and nonlinear equations and artificial neural networks. By
constant feedback from user to the system and vice
versa, both partners gradually learn more from each
other and improve the overall performance.
X.CONTROL
The final part consists of applying the
will of the user to the used application. The user
chooses an action by controlling his brain activity,
which is then detected and classified to
corresponding action. Feedback is provided to user
by audio-visual means e.g. when typing with
virtual keyboard, letter appears to the message box
etc.

The first patient, Matthew Nagle, a 25year-old Massachusetts man with a severe spinal
cord injury, has been paralyzed from the neck
down since 2001. Nagle is unable to move his arms
and legs after he was stabbed in the neck. During
57 sessions, at New England Sinai Hospital and
Rehabilitation Center, Nagle learned to open
simulated e-mail, draw circular shapes using a
paint program on the computer and play a simple
videogame, "neural Pong," using only his thoughts.
He could change the channel and adjust the volume
on a television, even while conversing. He was
ultimately able to open and close the fingers of a
prosthetic hand and use a robotic limb to grasp and
move objects. Despite a decline in neural signals
after few months, Nagle remained an active
participant in the trial and continued to aid the
clinical team in producing valuable feedback
concerning the BrainGate-Interface technology.

XI.TRAINING
The training is the part where the user
adapts to the BCI system. This training begins with
very simple exercises where the user is familiarized
with mental activity which is used to relay the
information to the computer. Motivation,
frustration, fatigue, etc. apply also here and their
effect should be taken into consideration when
planning the training procedures.
XII.BIO FEEDBACK
The definition of the biofeedback is
biological information which is returned to the
source that created it, so that source can
understand it and have control over it. This
biofeedback in BCI systems is usually provided
visually, e.g. the user sees cursor moving up or
down or letter being selected from the alphabet.

Fig 1 A boon to the paralyzed -Brain Gate Neural Interface

System.

XIII.NAGLES STATEMENT
I can't put it into words. It's justI use
my brain. I just thought it. I said, "Cursor go up to

the top right." And it did, and now I can control it

all over the screen. It will give me a sense of

In the 1980s, Apostolos Georgopoulos at Johns

Hopkins University found a mathematical
relationship between the (based on a function). He
also found that dispersed groups of neurons in
different areas of the brain collectively controlled
motor commands but was only able to record the
firings of neurons in one area at a time because of
technical limitations imposed by his equipment.
There has been rapid development in BCIs since
the mid-1990s. Several groups have been able to
capture complex brain motor centre signals using
recordings from (groups of neurons) and use these
to control external devices, including research
groups led by Richard Andersen, , Phillip
Kennedy,and Andrew Schwartz.

independence.
XIV.OTHER APPLICATIONS
Rats implanted with BCIs in Theodore
Berger's experiments.Several laboratories have
managed to record signals from monkey and rat in
order to operate BCIs to carry out movement.
Monkeys have navigated computer cursors on
screen and commanded robotic arms to perform
simple tasks simply by thinking about the task and
without any motor output. Other research on cats
has decoded visual signals.
Garrett Stanley's recordings of cat vision
using a BCI implanted in the lateral geniculate
nucleus (top row: original image; bottom row:
recording)
In 1999, researchers led by Garrett Stanley at
Harvard University decoded neuronal firings to
reproduce images seen by cats. The team used an
array of electrodes embedded in the (which
integrates all of the brains sensory input) of sharpeyed cats. Researchers targeted 177 brain cells in
the thalamus area, which decodes signals from the
retina. The cats were shown eight short movies,
and their neuron firings were recorded. Using
mathematical filters, the researchers decoded the
signals to generate movies of what the cats saw and
were able to reconstruct recognisable scenes and
moving objects.

Later experiments by Nicolelis using rhesus

monkeys, succeeded in and reproduced monkey
reaching and grasping movements in a robot arm.
With their deeply cleft and furrowed brains, rhesus
monkeys are considered to be better models for
human than owl monkeys. The monkeys were
trained to reach and grasp objects on a computer
screen by manipulating a joystick while
corresponding movements by a robot arm were
hidden.The monkeys were later shown the robot
directly and learned to control it by viewing its
movements. The BCI used velocity predictions to
control reaching movements and simultaneously
predicted hand gripping force.
Other labs that develop BCIs and algorithms
that decode neuron signals include from Brown
University, Andrew Schwartz from the University
of Pittsburgh and Richard Andersen from Caltech.
These researchers were able to produce working
BCIs even though they recorded signals from far
fewer neurons than Nicolelis (1530 neurons
versus 50200 neurons).
Donoghue's group reported training rhesus
monkeys to use a BCI to track visual targets on a
computer screen with or without assistance of a
joystick (closed-loop BCI). Schwartz's group
created a BCI for three-dimensional tracking in
virtual reality and also reproduced BCI control in a
robotic arm.
CONCLUSION
The idea of moving robots or prosthetic
devices not by manual control, but by mere
thinking (i.e., the brain activity of human
subjects) has been a fascinated approach. Medical
cures are unavailable for many forms of neural and
muscular paralysis. The enormity of the deficits
caused by paralysis is a strong motivation to pursue
BMI solutions. So this idea helps many patients to
control the prosthetic devices of their own by
simply thinking about the task. This technology is
well supported by the latest fields of Biomedical
Instrumentation,
Microelectronics,
signal

processing, Artificial Neural Networks and

Robotics which has overwhelming developments.
Hope these systems will be effectively
implemented for many Biomedical applications.
REFERENCE
[1]Brain computer Interfaces: where Human and Machine
meet, Published by IEEE Computer Society, IEEE 2007.
[2]Real-world Applications
for Brain-ComputerInterface
Technology, Melody M.Moore, IEEE Transactions on Neural
Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering, June 2003.
[3]http://www.en.wikipedia.com/braincomputerinterf ace
[4]www.scribd.com
[5]www.youtube.com
[6]"Brain Computer Interface Technology." Emotiv, 2009. 03
Mar. 2010.