Selecting the signals for a brain-machine interface

Richard A. Andersen, Sam Musallam, Bijan Pesaran

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

Abstract

Brain-machine interfaces are being developed to assist paralyzed patients by enabling them to operate machines with recordings of their own neural activity. Recent studies show that motor parameters, such as hand trajectory, and cognitive parameters, such as the goal and predicted value of an action, can be decoded from the recorded activity to provide control signals. Neural prosthetics that use simultaneously a variety of cognitive and motor signals can maximize the ability of patients to communicate and interact with the outside world. Although most studies have recorded electroencephalograms or spike activity, recent research shows that local field potentials (LFPs) offer a promising additional signal. The decode performances of LFPs and spike signals are comparable and, because LFP recordings are more long lasting, they might help to increase the lifetime of the prosthetics.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)720-726
Number of pages7
JournalCurrent Opinion in Neurobiology
Volume14
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 2004

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Neuroscience

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