Category: BCI

http://www.qualcomm.com/media/blog/2013/10/10/introducing-qualcomm-zeroth-processors-brain-inspired-computing

Similar to IBM’s “Brain on a Chip” and Intel’s “Neuromorphic Chip” initiatives, Qualcomm is developing “neuro-inspired” chips for robots, vision systems, brain implants and smartphones to more efficiently sense and process information.

Qualcomm would like its Zeroth processor to mimic human-like perception and have the ability to learn as biological brains do.  They claim to replicate brain architecture by developing neuron models that can be implemented in hardware.  Their goal is to create a “Neural Processing Unit” which is a class of processors that are parallel and reprogrammable, with comprehensive tools and human like functions.

http://www.dukehealth.org/health_library/news/touch-and-movement-neurons-shape-the-brain-s-internal-image-of-the-body

Miguel Nicolelis is one of the main contributors to brain machine interface.  In a series of innovative experiments, he demonstrates the intricate connections in the brain, attempting to create a coherent model of multi-sensory input.  His recent experiment shows that monkeys can be tricked when the multi-sensory input is only partially coherent.

A related study from Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute describes humans distorted self perception due to incoherency between visual and tactile input.

In the Nicolelis study, untrained monkeys were implanted with up to 384 electrodes to analyze how stimulus was encoded by the monkey brain. The monkeys were then shown a virtual simulation of their arm being touched, while simultaneously having their own arm touched. After a few minutes of synchronized stimulation, the physical component was removed. The areas of the monkeys’ brains responsible for tactile sensations, however, continued to respond to the virtual simulation, indicating that they felt physical sensation simply through visual association. The monkeys’ neuronal responses to the virtual stimulation came later than the responses to the physical stimulation. This suggests that the sensation was mediated by a longer pathway involving the visual system.

Instead of previously imagined single neuronal pathways, seemingly unrelated cortices apparently use a highly dynamic, cross functional process to form more of a continuously interacting grid or network. They also appear to cooperate quite closely in shaping the body schema, or the brain’s internal representation of the body

http://www.jneurosci.org/content/33/27/11239.abstract?sid=f2eef2ee-cad7-4d63-b90a-ac6566847078

Washington University researchers have created a computer model to help scientists learn how the brain’s anatomical structure contributes to the creation and maintenance of resting state networks.   They hope that the model will help them understand why certain portions of the brain work together when a person daydreams or is mentally idle, helping doctors better diagnose and treat brain injuries.

“We can give our model lesions like those we see in stroke or brain cancer, disabling groups of virtual cells to see how brain function is affected,” said Professor Maurizio Corbetta.  “We can also test ways to push the patterns of activity back to normal.”

Based on data from brain scans, researchers assembled 66 cognitive units in each hemisphere, and interconnected them in anatomical patterns similar to the connections present in the brain.  Individual units went through the signaling process at random low frequencies that had previously been observed in brain cells in culture and in recordings of resting brain activity.  The researchers let the model run, slowly changing the coupling, or the strength of the connections between units.   At a specific coupling value, the interconnections between units sending impulses soon began to create coordinated patterns of activity.

“Even though we started the cognitive units with random low activity levels, the connections allowed the units to synchronize,” said Professor Gustavo Deco of Universitat Pompeu Fabra. “The spatial pattern of synchronization that we eventually observed approximates very well—about 70 percent—to the patterns we see in scans of resting human brains.”