| http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20010521/flight.html
New Tech Joins Brains, Computers 
By Irene Brown, Discovery News May 21 — Researchers at NASA's Ames Research Center are in talks with several companies to market a new technology that marries the human nervous system with computers.
In a demonstration project , a test subject wearing an electrode-studded armband pantomimed gestures to land an airplane and successfully touched down in a computer simulation. Scientists are not proposing a hands-free cockpit anytime soon; rather, they envision new types of computer controls for a wide range of electronic products that, for example, have become too small for human hands to operate. Other potential markets include tele-surgery, where surgeons would make the hand movements to control tiny, precise remotely operated robotic instruments. "This is fundamentally a new way to talk with our mechanical world," said Charles Jorgensen, who heads Ames' NeuroEngineering Laboratory. The researchers have been developing the technology to capture and characterize muscle signals, which are then analyzed by a complicated mathematical algorithm and tied to a particular motion. "We've identified the building blocks and how they're put together in time and space," said Jorgensen. "How you use it is up to you." Citing confidentiality agreements, Jorgensen declined to name potential partners in negotiations with NASA to incorporate neurological controls into consumer electronic devices. However, Jorgensen did cite the high toll of repetitive stress injury and how a hands-free keyboard would go far toward eliminating the source of the problem. Typists, for example, could tap their fingers on a desk, a piece of paper, or just in mid-air. "Basically, anything that uses keyboard or a mouse is a candidate for this technology," said Jorgensen. The lab also is working on tapping directly into human brainwaves to control devices. In an experiment currently under way, subjects wired with sensors along the sides of their heads learn basic controls, such as a direction, just by thinking of the motor skill required to make the motion. Scientists have found the electrical signal sent out by the human brain for the body to make a motion is the same signal the brain sends out when it is just thinking about making the particular motion. "It's sort of like the brain is playing back a tape in imaginary time of the task that it performed in real-time," said NASA's Leonard Trejo, who is training test subjects to change their brain activity to navigate through a data set. "We're looking at using brain waves to control things rather than monitoring them," he said. The team has had a good start with a test of a martial arts expert who was able to show a tremendous amount of control over his brainwave activity, said Trejo. "Basically, we're looking at alternative ways to connect our nervous system to the physical world," said Jorgensen. |
