THE CUTTING EDGE: COMPUTING / TECHNOLOGY / INNOVATION : I Think, Therefore I Compute : Harnessing Brain Waves to Control Technology

It’s an idea straight out of “Star Trek”: controlling a machine using nothing but your mind. If someone told you they were going to do it here and now, you might be excused for thinking they had been watching a little too much television.

But like so many technical notions that first appeared in science fiction, the brain-controlled computer is fast becoming a reality. Advances in neurological research and the declining costs of sensors and wireless computer components have spawned the first generation of commercial mind-control products, along with related products that rely on other bodily signals.

Many of the new systems utilize electrical brain waves--either alpha, beta or mu waves--to control video games or the movement of a cursor on a computer screen. Other devices pick up on pulse, blood pressure or eye movements to handle operations that are normally carried out with a mouse or a keyboard.

Neurophysiologists and computer scientist believe these new systems could provide an important means of communications for disabled people whose ability to move and speak is severely impaired. They also could provide some interesting new entertainment possibilities. And they are helping researchers explore a fascinating metaphysical mystery: the extent to which human intention alone can alter the physical world.

“We’ve become so dependent on electronic circuitry to store and process information, that we’re very familiar with all kinds of ways to insulate that information . . . from electromagnetic fields, cosmic radiation, thermal fluctuation, etc.,” says Barbara Dunne, a researcher at Princeton University’s School of Engineering and Applied Science. “But what about a human sitting there, watching numbers on the screen? What effect does someone who desires a particular outcome have?”

Already, the person sitting there can have considerable influence over a computer--if they have electrodes like those used in an electroencephalogram (EEG) hooked up to their scalps.

“We’re using the electrical activity that the brain produces when it’s active--in the range of millionths of volts--that can be recorded from the scalp,” explains Jonathan Wolpaw, a neurophysiologist and director of the Wadsworth Center for Laboratories and Research of the New York Department of Health in Albany. “Over a period of weeks, we teach people to control a particular component of the EEG and use it to move a cursor around a computer screen to specific targets presented on the screen.”

In Wolpaw’s research, participants are hooked up to an EEG, which is in turn linked to a computer running a special software program called Gabriel. The subjects are presented with a cursor in the middle of a video screen, and a target in one corner. They use trial-and-error thoughts--imagining, for example, running, shooting baskets or floating--to try and shift the cursor to the target.

When they hit on a thought that works, they stick with it. According to Wolpaw, moving the cursor eventually becomes second nature, as automatic as moving your arm to pick something up. The goal is to develop a way for people who are totally or partially paralyzed to at least do some very simple things, such as say yes or no.

Others involved with brain-powered technologies have even more expansive goals. Ron Gordon, founder of The Other 90 Percent Inc., a Sausalito-based start-up firm, has invented the MindDrive, a finger pad worn like a ring that responds to the electrical impulses generated by the nervous system.

These impulses--known as galvanic skin response, the same signals recorded by lie detector tests--are filtered through sophisticated software that uses the impulses to control right-left or up-down motion of specially designed computer games. As with the EEG based devices, it’s a process of trial and error: “It’s like riding a bicycle,” says Gordon. “You get better with practice.”

The company, whose name refers to the portion of the human brain believed to be underutilized, plans to begin selling the MindDrive next year--bundled with games and the appropriate hardware to connect the device to a Windows personal computer--for under $200. Gordon sees it eventually becoming a general purpose alternative to the mouse and keyboard.

Interactive Brainwave Visual Analyzer (IBVA) Technologies Inc., a New York City-based company, is also a pioneer in commercializing mind-control technologies. The firm’s product, a small, wireless device that “reads” EEG-type brain waves and is attached to a PC, comes packaged with an interactive film whose plot unfolds according to emotional cues from the viewer.

Two IBVA applications are currently available: a one-channel application that costs $1,295 and a two-channel for $2,295. Helen Meschkow, IBVA vice president of technical and customer reports, says people who have experience meditating, which involves switching brain wave frequencies, have the best control over the technology.

At Boston College’s Carroll School of Management in Chestnut Hill, Mass., associate professor of computer science James Gips is focusing on the eyes, rather than the brain, as the control mechanism. Project Eagle Eyes, as it is known, involves electrodes placed around the eyes.

“The two eyes form a dipole [a pair of equal and opposite electric charges], and there is an electrical potential set up when you move the eyes,” says Gips. The electrodes connect to an amplifier, which in turn is connected to the computer. A program translates the signals from the electrodes into an on-screen cursor position.

Gips and his colleagues have used Eagle Eyes with severely disabled young people, ranging in age from 3 to 22. The highly disabled youngsters have used the system to “eye paint,” and run math and reading software. “They cannot speak or move any of their muscles, but they can move their eyes,” Gip says. “By putting a keyboard on the screen, we can teach them how to write and communicate just by looking at the letters they want to select.”

While all of these technologies are in their infancy, they’re attracting interest from many quarters. Apple Computer executives are interested in multimedia applications such as IBVA’s. Engineers at the Armstrong Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio have been investigating a brain-actuated control system, and subjects have used the interface to control the roll motion of a simple flight simulator. Researchers there want to identify and develop other possible applications for the technology.

But perhaps the most interesting long-term issues raised by these technologies is that they shift people’s focus from the machine to the operator. Some researchers have been fascinated by this question for years and have been looking at whether the human mind, unassisted by translating software, can affect the machines that it encounters.

Dunne of Princeton and her colleague, Robin Jahn, a professor of astronomy, have spent 14 years studying whether subjects can influence events on a computer screen with their thoughts. They’ve found that 50.02% of the time it appears that they can--and if the results were due only to chance, that figure would be 50%.

That may seem like a marginal result. But consider: people who were most effective at influencing machines were couples in love who directed their thoughts toward the same outcome. And as people gain a greater ability to control their brain waves, the researchers say, the possibility of controlling machines grows too.

After more than a decade of research into the question, Dunne is sure that, in certain circumstances, human intention is capable of influencing the physical world. Mr. Spock, with his seemingly supernatural powers, may soon have company.

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Look Ma, No Mouse

Several new technologies are allowing an unprecedented melding of mind and computer. Using brain waves, eye movement and other body signals, these new devices--several of which are available commercially--can help the disabled communicate, move a cursor or play a video game without ever touching a mouse or keyboard. A look at how some of them work:

* Brain Waves

At the Wadsworth Center for Laboratories and Research in New York, researchers are turning brain waves into cursor movements.

1. Electrodes, which read the minute electrical activity of the brain and are commonly used in electroencephalograms, are attached to the user’s scalp.

2. A program called Gabriel analyzes the brain waves, turning different waves into different cursor movement.

3. The user learns to control the cursor through trial and error, using random thoughts. When the user hits on a thought that works, he or she sticks with it. For example, the thought of running moves the cursor up and left to the desired target here, so the user thinks of running to move the cursor in that direction each time.

* Eye Movements

At Boston College, researchers are using electrodes placed around the eyes to control a cursor. The developers of this technology say it will help the severely disabled communicate. The basic idea is that the cursor will move to whatever part of the screen the user is looking at. The impulses from the electrodes are sent to amplifiers that increase the eye movement signal 5,000 times. Software then translates the signals into cursor coordinates on the screen. For example, wikth an alphabet grid on the screen, a user can spell out a sentence by looking at each letter. Best performance so far: a 20-character message in 21 seconds.

* Finger Pad

The Other 90% Technologies of Sausalito, Calif., has developed MindDrive which it hopes to market with computer games next year. Instead of reading brain waves directly, as an electroencephalogram does, a pad worn on a finger reads the galvanic skin responses (heartbeat, blood pressure, temperature) much the way a polygraph does. Software then translates those readings into computer commands that can move the desired object. The device picks up on positive and negative thoughts as well as emotional cues.

Sources: New York State Department of Health, Boston College, The Other 90% Technologies Inc.

Researched by ROBERT BURNS / Los Angeles Times

Look Ma, No Mousem MATT MOODY / Los Angeles Times