Grad student tests virtual-reality uses

hile several teams around the world are working on brain-computer interfaces, computer science graduate student Jessica Bayliss is the first to show that detection of the brain's weak electrical signals is possible in a busy environment filled with activity. She has shown that volunteers who don a virtual-reality helmet in her lab can control elements in a virtual world, including turning lights on and off and bringing a mock-up of a car to a stop by thought alone. Though all this is currently taking place only in virtual reality, the Rochester team is confident that the technology will make the jump to the "real world" and should soon enable people to look around a real apartment and take control in a way they couldn't before.

The line of research, which links a brain and computer in a near real-world environment, may someday allow patients with extreme paralysis to regain some control of their surroundings, say the project's developers. It also could eventually eliminate keyboards and computer mice as the go-betweens connecting people's thoughts and the actions they wish to see in their environment.

"This is a remarkable feat of engineering," said Dana Ballard, professor of computer science and Bayliss's advisor. "She's managed to separate out the tiny brain signals from all the electric noise of the virtual-reality gear. We usually try to read brain signals in a pristine, quiet environment, but a real environment isn't so quiet. Jessica has found a way to effectively cut through the interference."

"Virtual reality is a safe testing ground," said Bayliss, whose research is supported by the National Institutes of Health. "We can see what works and what doesn't without the danger of driving a wheelchair into a wall. We can learn how brain interfaces will work in the real world, instead of how they work when someone is just looking at test patterns and letters. The brain normally interacts with a 3-D world, so I want to see if it gives off different signals when dealing with a 3-D world than with a chart."

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