A novel visual brain-computer interfaces paradigm based on evoked related potentials evoked by weak and small number of stimuli

Frontiers in Neuroscience

Neuroscience

Kun Wang¹  Weibo Yi²  Fangzhou Xu³  Xiaoyu Zhou⁴  Runyuan Gao⁴  Xiaolin Xiao⁵  Dong Ming⁵  Minpeng Xu⁶ 

[1] Academy of Medical Engineering and Translational Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;Beijing Institute of Mechanical Equipment, Beijing, China;International School for Optoelectronic Engineering, Qilu University of Technology, Shandong Academy of Sciences, Jinan, China;School of Precision Instruments and Optoelectronics Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;School of Precision Instruments and Optoelectronics Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;Academy of Medical Engineering and Translational Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;School of Precision Instruments and Optoelectronics Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;Academy of Medical Engineering and Translational Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China;International School for Optoelectronic Engineering, Qilu University of Technology, Shandong Academy of Sciences, Jinan, China;

关键词: v-BCI;    weak stimuli;    evoked related potential;    discriminative spatial patterns;    information transfer rate;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fnins.2023.1178283

 received in 2023-03-02, accepted in 2023-03-20,  发布年份 2023

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

IntroductionTraditional visual Brain-Computer Interfaces (v-BCIs) usually use large-size stimuli to attract more attention from users and then elicit more distinct and robust EEG responses, which would cause visual fatigue and limit the length of use of the system. On the contrary, small-size stimuli always need multiple and repeated stimulus to code more instructions and increase separability among each code. These common v-BCIs paradigms can cause problems such as redundant coding, long calibration time, and visual fatigue.MethodsTo address these problems, this study presented a novel v-BCI paradigm using weak and small number of stimuli, and realized a nine-instruction v-BCI system that controlled by only three tiny stimuli. Each of these stimuli were located between instructions, occupied area with eccentricities subtended 0.4°, and flashed in the row-column paradigm. The weak stimuli around each instruction would evoke specific evoked related potentials (ERPs), and a template-matching method based on discriminative spatial pattern (DSP) was employed to recognize these ERPs containing the intention of users. Nine subjects participated in the offline and online experiments using this novel paradigm. ResultsThe average accuracy of the offline experiment was 93.46% and the online average information transfer rate (ITR) was 120.95 bits/min. Notably, the highest online ITR achieved 177.5 bits/min.DiscussionThese results demonstrate the feasibility of using a weak and small number of stimuli to implement a friendly v-BCI. Furthermore, the proposed novel paradigm achieved higher ITR than traditional ones using ERPs as the controlled signal, which showed its superior performance and may have great potential of being widely used in various fields.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
Copyright © 2023 Xiao, Gao, Zhou, Yi, Xu, Wang, Xu and Ming.