Descrizione del progetto
Verso una migliore qualità della vita per i pazienti neurologici
Le interfacce intracorticali cervello-computer stanno contribuendo a cambiare la vita di molte persone affette da disturbi del movimento. Tali interfacce analizzano i segnali cerebrali e li traducono in comandi che vengono poi trasmessi a dispositivi che svolgono una specifica azione, come controllare il cursore di un computer. Le attuali interfacce di ultima generazione sono comunque più lente e meno precise rispetto ai movimenti naturali. Il progetto IntuitiveBCI, finanziato dall’UE, intende migliorare le attuali interfacce sfruttando le risorse distribuite proprie del cervello per comandare movimenti automatici in maniera abile e intuitiva, cosa che richiede un piccolo sforzo mentale. Il lavoro del progetto consentirà lavori traslazionali futuri che possono portare ad un comando più abile e intuitivo rispetto a quanto offerto dagli approcci correnti.
Obiettivo
More than 25% of people over the age of 50 suffer a movement disorder; many of them have a functional disability as a result.
Intracortical Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) that extract or “decode” the user’s intent based on recordings from tens or hundreds of cortical neurons have enabled paralyzed patients to control computer cursors, robots, or even their own limbs just by modulating their neural activity. Despite these successes, BCI control still falls short compared to natural limb control: it is far less skilled, and it requires significantly more mental effort.
My goal is to overcome these two limitations through a novel “Intuitive BCI” that leads to enhanced control compared to current approaches. Rather than follow the dominant trends of developing new decoder algorithms and interface technologies, I will adopt a unique, previously unexplored approach: to leverage the brain’s own distributed resources to control automatic movements in a skilled and intuitive manner requiring little mental effort.
Automatic movements depend critically on subcortical brain structures whose activity is not probed by current cortical BCIs. To develop my novel approach to BCI based on the neural control of automatic movements, I will combine: 1) recent breakthroughs to record from thousands of neurons across the mouse brain; 2) a novel theory to model neural population activity that I have helped establish; and 3) new experimental tasks to isolate the cortico-subcortical information underlying automatic movements. This information will provide inputs to the proposed Intuitive BCI. I seek to prove that it leads to more skilled and intuitive control than current approaches, even allowing users to multi-task –an unprecedented feat in the field.
This timely, multidisciplinary research will push BCI control forward, beyond current state-of-the-art approaches limited to cortical control. It will also help realize BCI’s promise to improve the quality of life of neurological patients
Parole chiave
Programma(i)
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Invito a presentare proposte
(si apre in una nuova finestra) ERC-2020-STG
Vedi altri progetti per questo bandoMeccanismo di finanziamento
ERC-STG -Istituzione ospitante
SW7 2AZ LONDON
Regno Unito