Most of us use fingers to type on our computers. But can we input words just by focusing our mind or thinking about them? How about using your brain waves and electrodes to do the typing? That may sound like science fiction, but it is already a technological reality.
Such a brain-computer interface (BCI) has been available to English-language speakers for many years, mainly because the pioneering scientists have all been from overseas. Indeed, the world's most famous BCI device is used by renowned British physicist Stephen Hawking. He suffers ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, which has caused him to lose all muscle control, and his device produces synthesised speech.
Now, Chinese University researchers have come up with the first BCI for Chinese speakers. 'Imagine if you can't speak, write, or use sign language,' said Dr James Minett, an engineer and co-leader of the university team. 'You can still use electrodes to pick up signals in the brain.'
Electrical signals, or brain waves, are generated when neurons communicate with each other. When a person visually focuses on a word or a Chinese character stroke displayed on a monitor, there is a surge in electrical activity for a split second. The electrodes pick up the signal and tell the computer to input the selected alphabet or stroke. A patient has to repeat this mental sequence several times to complete a word. Just as an English speaker types a word by inputting letter by letter, a Chinese speaker inputs a Chinese character stroke by stroke.
This can be quite tiresome for a BCI user and Minett admits the process is slow and accuracy-limited. Users also need to wear strange-looking caps wired with electrodes. His best-performing volunteers took almost one minute to type one Chinese character. But when a patient was completely paralysed and without speech, being able to generate a few words to express a thought, feeling or need was already a significant improvement in quality of life, he said.
The university team is working on new software to improve character prediction for quicker input and refine the display of words and characters to make it more user-friendly.