A sneak preview of my master thesis.

1. N400 Working towards mind reading

2. Brain Computer Interfacing Creating a direct link between your brain and a computer

3. That sounds an awful lot like mind reading...

4. Work towards mind reading BCI

5. Can a computer detect what I am thinking about? Not directly (yet)

6. What can we detect? Relaxation (alpha waves) Imagined movement (ERD/ERS) Recognition (P300) Annoying flashing lights (SSVEP) Priming (N400) ... Simple physiological responses

7. N400 Discovered during a language study Reading senseless sentences: I drink coffee with cream and sugar I drink coffee with cream and socks

8. ERP7 word sentences

9. Priming apple fruit juice eating tree Newton healthy picking pear worm

10. Priming Probe Probe Probe apple fruit juice Probe Probe eating tree Prime Probe Probe Newton healthy Probe Probe picking pear worm Probe

11. ERP2 words

12. How can we use this for mind reading? Let the subject choose his own prime Don’t prime on a stimulus, but prime only by thinking about the object Guess the prime by showing different probes

13. Experimental setup Give one of two possible physical objects to subject Lo beep – close eyes and think about object Hi beep – open eyes Show a probe word that is related to one of the two possible objects, record EEG Can the computer tell which object was shown?

14. ERPonly a probe word

15. ERPonly a probe word

16. Future researchbuilding a search tree

17. Challenges When no result: problem in experiment, recording or data processing?Process of elimination More neuroscience than computer scienceRead up on neuroscience Ambiguous results: only works on some subjectsVerify results with statistics and control scenarios

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