NCS-FO: Collaborative Research: Developing Underwater EEG Electrodes for Octopus Research

NCS-FO：合作研究：开发用于章鱼研究的水下脑电图电极

• 批准号: 1845123
• 负责人: Gideon Caplovitz
• 金额: $ 3.99万
• 依托单位: Board of Regents, NSHE, obo University of Nevada, Reno
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-09-01 至 2020-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1845123&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: NCS; FO; Collaborative; Research; Developing

The octopus is a social animal, with high intelligence and problem-solving skills, that is very distant from humans in terms of its evolution. This project aims to fabricate neuroelectric sensors and experimental protocols that would enable studying visual and higher level cognitive processes in the octopus while they are engaged in natural behaviors in an underwater environment. This will necessitate development of new engineering solutions for crafting electroencephalography (EEG) sensors that can record signal underwater, new solutions for removing noise artifacts from these highly complicated recordings, as well as careful design of experiments that could study such behaviors in a virtual-reality environment. While the brain of the octopus is very different from that of the human, it does support well-defined cognitive functions. Therefore, understanding whether and how octopuses' brains implement processes such as learning, attention, habituation, and surprise can produce new and important understandings of how neurobiological systems can support function. This research might reveal that the neural substrates of cognitive function in the octopus are organized according to principles that differ drastically from those found in in humans.This EAGER project has several aims. It will develop the first underwater EEG, first testing well-validated paradigms on humans performing task underwater and benchmarking against known waveforms. The electrodes will be constructed so that they do not corrode in salt water. It will also develop high-quality virtual reality stimulation that could impact octopuses' behavior in an underwater environment. It will utilize EEG frequency-tagging techniques to determine processing of environmental stimulus by the octopus. This will allow studying whether octopuses present characteristic responses that are analogous to surprise, adaptation, working memory and attention effects (in primates and other vertebrates). The study will also allow answering how and in what manner do octopuses sleep. All data, artifacts and modeling software will be made publicly available and constitute an important resource for the community. The results of this study could impact our general understanding of how brains support complex cognitive functions, with direct relevance to artificial intelligence efforts.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

章鱼是一种群居动物，具有高智商和解决问题的能力，在进化方面与人类相去甚远。该项目旨在制造神经电传感器和实验方案，使之能够研究章鱼在水下环境中从事自然行为时的视觉和更高水平的认知过程。这将需要开发新的工程解决方案，用于制作可以在水下记录信号的脑电(EEG)传感器，开发新的解决方案来消除这些高度复杂的记录中的噪声伪影，以及仔细设计可以在虚拟现实环境中研究此类行为的实验。虽然章鱼的大脑与人类的大脑非常不同，但它确实支持明确定义的认知功能。因此，了解章鱼的大脑是否以及如何执行学习、注意力、习惯化和惊讶等过程，可以对神经生物学系统如何支持功能产生新的和重要的理解。这项研究可能会揭示章鱼认知功能的神经基础是按照与人类截然不同的原理来组织的。这项急切的项目有几个目标。它将开发第一个水下脑电，首先在执行水下任务的人类身上测试经过充分验证的范例，并与已知波形进行基准比较。电极的构造将使它们在盐水中不会腐蚀。它还将开发高质量的虚拟现实刺激，可能会影响章鱼在水下环境中的行为。它将利用脑电频率标记技术来确定章鱼对环境刺激的处理。这将有助于研究章鱼是否表现出类似于惊讶、适应、工作记忆和注意力效应的特征反应(在灵长类和其他脊椎动物中)。这项研究还将允许回答章鱼是如何以及以何种方式睡觉的。所有数据、人工制品和建模软件都将公开提供，并构成社区的重要资源。这项研究的结果可能会影响我们对大脑如何支持复杂认知功能的总体理解，这与人工智能的努力直接相关。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。