Brain activity operate wheelchair???? Change TV channels????

New Technology From Hitachi Controls Electronic Devices by Reading Brain
Activity
Friday, June 22, 2007 0321 PDT


HATOYAMA, Japan -- Forget the clicker: A new technology in Japan could let
you control electronic devices without lifting a finger simply by reading
brain activity.

The "brain-machine interface" developed by Hitachi Inc. analyzes slight
changes in the brain's blood flow and translates brain motion into electric
signals.

A cap connects by optical fibers to a mapping device, which links, in turn,
to a toy train set via a control computer and motor during one recent
demonstration at Hitachi's Advanced Research Laboratory in Hatoyama, just
outside Tokyo.

"Take a deep breath and relax," said Kei Utsugi, a researcher, while
demonstrating the device on Wednesday.

At his prompting, a reporter did simple calculations in her head, and the
train sprang forward _ apparently indicating activity in the brain's frontal
cortex, which handles problem solving.

Activating that region of the brain _ by doing sums or singing a song _ is
what makes the train run, according to Utsugi. When one stops the
calculations, the train stops, too.

Underlying Hitachi's brain-machine interface is a technology called optical
topography, which sends a small amount of infrared light through the brain's
surface to map out changes in blood flow.

Although brain-machine interface technology has traditionally focused on
medical uses, makers like Hitachi and Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co.
have been racing to refine the technology for commercial application.

Hitachi's scientists are set to develop a brain TV remote controller letting
users turn a TV on and off or switch channels by only thinking.

Honda, whose interface monitors the brain with an MRI machine like those
used in hospitals, is keen to apply the interface to intelligent,
next-generation automobiles.

The technology could one day replace remote controls and keyboards and
perhaps help disabled people operate electric wheelchairs, beds or
artificial limbs.

Initial uses would be helping people with paralyzing diseases communicate
even after they have lost all control of their muscles.

Since 2005, Hitachi has sold a device based on optical topography that
monitors brain activity in paralyzed patients so they can answer simple
questions _ for example, by doing mental calculations to indicate "yes" or
thinking of nothing in particular to indicate "no."

"We are thinking of various kinds of applications," project leader Hideaki
Koizumi said. "Locked-in patients can speak to other people by using this
kind of brain machine interface."

A key advantage to Hitachi's technology is that sensors don't have to
physically enter the brain. Earlier technologies developed by U.S. companies
like Neural Signals Inc. required implanting a chip under the skull.

Still, major stumbling blocks remain.

Size is one issue, though Hitachi has developed a prototype compact headband
and mapping machine that together weigh only about two pounds.

Another would be to tweak the interface to more accurately pick up on the
correct signals while ignoring background brain activity.

Any brain-machine interface device for widespread use would be "a little
further down the road," Koizumi said.

He added, however, that the technology is entertaining in itself and could
easily be applied to toys.

"It's really fun to move a model train just by thinking," he said.