Utilizing the mind to immediately management an object was lengthy the stuff of science fiction, and in 1988 the imaginative and prescient grew to become a actuality.
IEEE Life Senior Member Stevo Bozinovski and Members Mihail Sestakov and Dr. Liljana Bozinovska used a scholar volunteer’s electroencephalogram (EEG) mind indicators to maneuver a robotic alongside a closed-circuit observe. Bozinovski and Sestakov had been electrical engineering and laptop science professors at Saints Cyril and Methodius College, in Skopje, North Macedonia. Bozinovska, a doctor, taught within the college’s medical college. Their achievement has paved the best way for EEG-controlled wheelchairs and exoskeletons.
IEEE commemorated their work with an IEEE Milestone throughout a ceremony on the college on 10 October.
“The accomplishment shouldn’t be solely significant domestically,” Vladimir Atanasovski mentioned on the dedication ceremony. “It displays advantages for the whole humanity.” Atanasovski is dean of the college’s electrical engineering and data applied sciences college.
“It was at this very college, 35 years in the past, the place a relationship between two beforehand distant areas [robotics and EEG signals] was fashioned,” he added. “This outstanding work confirmed that science fiction can develop into a actuality.
“Controlling a robotic utilizing human mind indicators for the primary time superior each electrical and laptop engineering and science, led to worldwide analysis on brain-computer interfaces, and opened an express communication channel between robots and people.”
Utilizing engineering to exhibit psychokinesis
Bozinovski, Sestakov, and Bozinovska constructed a system to ship instructions to a robotic based mostly on EEG sign processing. The strategy is noninvasive; all you need to do is place electrodes on a volunteer’s scalp.
The three researchers used a Movit Line Tracer II robotic they constructed from a equipment from Japanese equipment store Elehobby, now known as Elekit. The robotic had two plastic discs that sat on high of one another and held the digital parts between them. Its two wheels had been managed with a begin/cease mechanical swap.
“Engineers are the driving power in each nation, contributing to the welfare and progress of societies.”—Stevo Pendarovsk
The robotic, powered by batteries, drove on a observe drawn on a flat floor, in accordance with the Milestone proposal entry on the Engineering Expertise and Historical past Wiki.
However the researchers nonetheless didn’t know the way they had been going to translate the mind indicators into instructions. Bozinovska instructed utilizing the EEG’s distinguished alpha-range frequency of 8 to 12 hertz—often known as the mu rhythm. It’s a synchronized sample {of electrical} exercise within the a part of the mind that controls voluntary motion. The frequency will increase when an individual is relaxed and never transferring.
Bozinovska’s idea was that the sample would command the Line Tracer. Individuals making an attempt to manage the robotic would obtain leisure by closing their eyes. To cease the robotic from transferring, they might carry out a voluntary motion similar to opening their eyes.
Bozinovski, Sestakov, and Bozinovska designed an experiment to check her idea.
Transferring a robotic utilizing mind indicators
Two rooms had been constructed to conduct the experiment. One was known as the “robotic area,” and had a desk on which sat an oblong closed-circuit observe with markings the place the robotic can be commanded to cease.Saints Cyril and Mehtodius College/IEEE
Bozinovski and Sestakov constructed two rooms within the college’s Laboratory of Clever Machines and Bioinformation Methods to conduct the experiment. One was known as the “robotic area,” as Bozinovski described it within the Milestone entry. Within the room was a desk on which sat an oblong closed-circuit observe with markings the place the robotic can be commanded to cease.
The second room housed the expertise together with analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog converters, an IBM XT private laptop, a transistor amplifier, and a differential biomedical amplifier, which measured the voltage distinction between the mind’s amplitude and frequency and the time it took for them to vary. Bozinovski and Sestakov changed the mechanical swap with an EEG-emulated management swap that was linked to the transistor amplifier. The scholar volunteer sat within the second room.
A window linked the 2 rooms. Wires from the D/A converter hooked up to the robotic hung from the ceiling, properly out of the best way of the robotic’s motion.
Electrodes had been positioned on the highest and heart of the volunteer’s head, close to the medial parietal cortex—the a part of the mind that completes visible scene processing. Extra had been positioned behind the precise ear, close to the mastoid, which perceives visible sensations. Others had been positioned on the brow, to gather the bottom electrical sign, from which the differential biomedical amplifier may detect if the frequency elevated.
To maneuver the robotic, the coed relaxed, with eyes closed. The differential biomedical amplifier recorded the EEG indicators and inputted them into the pc with the assistance of the A/D converter set at 300 Hz. Recognition software program created by Bozinovski and Sestakov translated the indicators right into a go command. The pc then despatched a 5-volt logic pulse by means of the D/A converter—which the transistor amplifier magnified and despatched to the robotic. The volunteer was capable of cease the Line Tracer by opening their eyes.
Bozinovski, Sestakov, and Bozinovska offered their findings on the 1988 IEEE Worldwide Engineering in Medication and Biology Convention.
North Macedonia’s president on the significance of engineers
“Engineers are the driving power in each nation, contributing to the welfare and progress of societies,” Stevo Pendarovski, president of North Macedonia, mentioned on the dedication ceremony.
“Let this genuinely distinctive occasion of nice significance for Macedonian engineering particularly, but in addition for Macedonian science and society as a complete, be an inspiration for all college students, professors, and future engineers,” Pendarovski mentioned, “to create and contribute to constructing a contemporary and technologically superior world.”
IEEE President Saifur Rahman additionally attended the ceremony.
A plaque recognizing the expertise is displayed exterior the Saints Cyril and Methodius College electrical engineering school constructing. The Laboratory of Clever Machines and Bioinformation Methods, the place the Milestone was achieved, is within the constructing. It reads:
In 1988, within the Laboratory of Clever Machines and Bioinformation Methods, human mind indicators managed the motion of a bodily object (a robotic) for the primary time worldwide. This linked electroencephalogram (EEG) indicators collected from a mind with robotics analysis, opening a brand new channel for communication between people and machines. EEG-controlled gadgets (wheelchairs, exoskeletons, and many others.) have benefited quite a few customers and expanded expertise’s function in trendy society.
Administered by the IEEE Historical past Middle and supported by donors, the Milestone program acknowledges excellent technical developments all over the world.
The IEEE North Macedonia Part sponsored the nomination.
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