Mind reading machines

Last autumn, scientists at the Dalle Molle Institute for Perceptual Artificial Intelligence (Idiap) in canton Valais began experimenting with ways of harnessing brainwaves via electrodes to send simple commands to a computer.

According to director Jean-Albert Ferrez, the institute has developed technology that can roughly identify what a person is thinking about, based on his or her mental activity.

“The computer can detect whether you are thinking about a calculation, a place, a colour or even what you want to eat for dinner,” he told swissinfo.

“But it’s not good enough yet to detect exactly what colour you’re thinking of.”

Mind reading

The process works by attaching electrodes to a patient’s scalp, which record the electromagnetic activity of the brain.

These electrical signals are sent to a “neuro-classifier” which is trained to recognise specific patterns of brain activity.

The computer then matches this activity to a corresponding task such as turning on a light or even writing a letter using an on-screen “virtual keyboard”.

“Through mental activity alone, a subject can select letters and write messages,” explained José Millan, a senior researcher at the institute.

Early days

The project is still in its experimental phase and, according to Ferrez, it could take years before practical applications are developed for the technology.

However, he believes the research might someday offer an unprecedented degree of autonomy to hundreds of thousands of severely disabled people, such as quadriplegics.

“This technology would be absolutely ideal for a person who is paralysed from the neck down,” said Ferrez.

“There are some prototypes that exist, which allow a wheelchair-user to guide the chair back and forth, or left and right, based on various brain activity, which is translated into commands which drive the computer.”

For the time being, the main focus of Idiap’s brain research is on helping physically disabled people; however, Millan predicts the technology will eventually find its way into everyday life.

“In the long term, we think this could be integrated with other forms of exchange, such as speech or movement, in order to make interaction between humans and machines, as well as between humans, more natural and direct,” he told swissinfo.

“There is nothing more direct than the act of thinking.”