Brain–Computer Interfaces - Index of

BCIs in the Laboratory and at Home: The Wadsworth Research Program 107
on the user’s quality of life [54]. In collaboration with colleagues at the University
of Tübingen, and the University of South Florida, we have been studying home use
(e.g. [24, 37, 44–46, 51]. This initial work has identified critical factors essential
for moving out of the lab and into a home setting where people use the BCI in an
autonomous fashion. The most pressing needs are to develop a more compact system,
to streamline operational characteristics to simplify the process for caregivers,
and to provide users with effective and reliable communication applications [51].
Our prototype home system includes a laptop computer, a flat panel display,
an eight-channel electrode cap and an amplifier with a built-in A/D board. We
have addressed making the system more user friendly by automating several of the
BCI2000 software processes, and enabling the caregiver to start the program with a
short series of mouse clicks. The caregiver’s major tasks are to place the electrode
cap and inject gel into the electrodes, a process that takes about 5 min. The software
has also been modified to include a menu-driven item selection structure that
allows the BCI user to navigate various hierarchical menus to perform specific tasks
(e.g., basic communication, basic needs, word processing and environmental controls)
more easily and rapidly than earlier versions of the SMR [53] and P300 [44]
software. In addition, a speech output option has been added for users who desire
this ability. A more complete description of the system is provided in Vaughan et al.
[54].
Most recently, we have begun to provide severely disabled users with in-home
P300-based BCI systems to use for daily communication and control tasks [45]. The
system presents an 8 × 9 matrix of letters, numbers, and function calls that operate
as a keyboard to make the Windows-based programs (e.g., Eudora, Word, Excel,
PowerPoint, Acrobat) completely accessible via EEG control. The system normally
uses an ISI of 125 ms (a 62.5 ms flash followed by a 62.5 ms blank period), and each
series of intensifications lasts for 12.75 s. The first user has now had his system for
more than 3 years, and three others have been given systems more recently. Ongoing
average accuracies for the 6 × 6or8× 9 matrix have ranged from 51 to 83% (while
chance performance for the two matrices is 2.7 and 1.4%, respectively). Each user’s
data are uploaded every week via the Internet and analyzed automatically using our
standard SWLDA procedure, so that classification coefficients can be updated as
needed [21, 47]. Using a remote access protocol, we can also monitor performance
in real-time and update system parameters as needed. In actual practice, the home
system usually functions well from week to week and even month to month with
little or no active intervention on our part.
These initial results suggest that a P300-BCI can be useful to individuals
with severe motor disabilities, and that their caregivers can learn to support its
operation without excessive technical oversight [44, 45, 51]. We are concentrating
on further increasing the system’s functionality and decreasing its need for
technical oversight. Furthermore, together with colleagues at Wharton School of
Business (University of Pennsylvania), we have established a non-profit foundation
(www.braincommunication.org) to enable the dissemination and support of home
BCI systems for the severely disabled people who need them.