After years of struggling to create a direct link between our minds and technology, we have finally made our first step- and it’s all thanks to a team of researchers from Wits University in Johannesburg, South Africa. In a study published in the journal Medical Express, the team has been able to link the human brain to the internet- and in real time!
The project, named “Brainternet”, basically converts brain signals “…into an Internet of Things (IoT) node on the World Wide Web.” They gather brainwave EEG signals via an Emotiv EEG device (which looks as freaky as you think it is), then transmit the signals to a Raspberry Pi computer. The computer will then livestream the data to an application programming interface. Finally, the data will be displayed on an open website, allowing any user from anywhere in the world to view the brain activity.
Source: Vanderbilt University
“Brainternet is a new frontier in brain-computer interface systems,” says Adam Pantanowitz, supervisor of Brainternet and professor at the Wits School of Electrical and Information Engineering. “There is a lack of easily understood data about how a human brain works and processes information. Brainternet seeks to simplify a person’s understanding of their own brain and the brains of others. It does this through continuous monitoring of brain activity as well as enabling some interactivity.”
Source: La Verdad Nos Espera
Pantanowitz suggests that the project will potentially go further, stating that this is only the beginning. For now, their project is fully functional on the website, but is very bare bones and limited to stimulus, such as arm movement. So the team plans to allow a more interactive experience between the user and the brain. Brainternet can be further improved to classify recordings through a smartphone app that will provide data for a machine-learning algorithm. In future, there could be information transferred in both directions – inputs and outputs to the brain,” says Pantanowitz.
This project could also provide a good stepping stone to other brain-to-computer projects, such as Elon Musk’s Neural Lace and Bryan Johnson’s Kernel.
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