CAREER: Brain-Tongue-Computer Interfacing

PI的长期研究计划包括探索通往人类中枢神经系统(CNS)的新途径，以扩大我们对这个高度复杂的系统的了解并了解其工作原理，以及开发创新技术和研究工具，使我们能够通过这些途径与中枢神经系统直接或间接沟通。特别是，他热衷于在设备中利用和评估新的接口技术，这些设备将帮助患有慢性残疾和神经系统疾病(如失明、耳聋和瘫痪)的个人改善和延长他们的生活质量。考虑到这些总体目标，在这个项目中，PI将专注于探索使用自愿舌头运动来替代传统上由手臂和手执行的一些个人环境控制功能。在过去，在没有舌头运动的情况下，这是不可能的，而不妨碍舌头在吞咽、呼吸和说话中的关键作用。PI之前开发并成功测试了一种新的无线、隐蔽和可穿戴的技术，他称之为舌头驱动系统(TDS)，可以在口腔空间的特定用户定义位置内实时指示舌头位置。在TDS原型的基础上，他将探索是否可以利用舌头的固有特征及其丰富的运动能力作为通往人脑的中间途径。换句话说，他将寻求通过增强TDS硬件、信号处理算法和图形用户界面软件的功能来创建一个大脑-舌头-计算机接口(BTCI)，以支持用户将同时可用的大量选择，以及目前用于促进导航和计算机访问的比例控制能力。PI将进行实验，以评估BCTI平台的性能、可用性和可接受性，并将利用它来实现对与随意舌动相关的人为因素的基本了解。最后，PI将把他的实时3-D舌头跟踪技术与多通道无线神经记录相结合，探索不受限制的舌头运动与语音、呼吸和吞咽方面的整个肌肉/单个运动单位活动之间的关系。这项研究将最终改变许多严重残疾人的生活，帮助他们过上积极、自立和富有成效的生活。BTCI等解决方案还可能通过减轻家庭成员和尽职照顾者的负担，帮助降低医疗保健和辅助生活成本。在指挥、控制和导航任务中利用舌头运动作为一种未开发的人类运动方式涉及的成本和收益目前尚不清楚；对同时进行的感觉、运动和认知任务中存在和不存在舌头运动的人类性能进行量化分析，可能会在人类系统集成方面带来新的科学发现。PI的3-D舌头跟踪技术还将影响言语/语言治疗，以及涉及舌头运动的沟通和睡眠障碍的治疗。PI将探索BTCI技术在有特殊需要的儿童的教育环境中的使用，通过诸如生活工具等项目，还将开展外联工作，让K-12学生了解中枢神经系统及其相关损伤的事实，以及通过工程解决方案解决这些问题的不同方法。

The PI's long-term research plans involve exploring new pathways to the human central nervous system (CNS) in order to expand our knowledge about this highly complex system and understand how it works, and developing innovative technologies and research tools that will enable direct or indirect communication with the CNS through such pathways. In particular, he is keen to utilize and evaluate new interfacing technologies in devices that will help individuals who suffer from chronic disabilities and neurological diseases, such as blindness, deafness, and paralysis to improve and extend their quality of life. With these general goals in mind, the PI will in this project focus on exploring the use of voluntary tongue motion as a substitute for some of the functions traditionally performed by the arms and hands in personal environmental control. This has not been possible in the past absent access to tongue motion without impeding the tongue's key roles in swallowing, respiration, and speech. The PI has previously developed and successfully tested a new wireless, unobtrusive, and wearable technology he calls the Tongue Drive System (TDS), to indicate tongue position in real time within certain user-defined locations in the oral space. Building upon the TDS prototype, he will explore whether the inherent characteristics of the tongue and its rich motor capabilities can be harnessed as an intermediary pathway to the human brain. In other words, he will seek to create a Brain-Tongue-Computer Interface (BTCI) by enhancing the functionality of the TDS hardware, signal processing algorithms, and GUI software to support a large number of choices that will be simultaneously available to users, in addition to the proportional control capability that is currently employed to facilitate navigation and computer access. The PI will conduct experiments to evaluate the performance, usability, and acceptability of the BCTI platform, and will employ it to achieve a fundamental understanding of human factors associated with voluntary tongue motions. Finally, the PI will combine his real time 3-D tongue tracking technology with multi-channel wireless neural recording to explore the relationship between unconstrained tongue movements and whole muscle/single motor unit activities in speech, respiration, and swallowing without any bodily restraints.Broader Impacts: Individuals who are severely disabled as a result of various causes from spinal cord injuries to stroke, cerebral palsy, and ALS find it extremely difficult to carry out everyday tasks without continuous help. This research will ultimately transform the lives of many persons with severe disabilities, by helping them live active, self-supportive, and productive lives. Solutions such as the BTCI may also help reduce healthcare and assisted-living costs by relieving the burden on family members and dedicated caregivers. Utilization of the tongue's motion as an untapped human motor modality in command, control, and navigation tasks involves costs and benefits which are at present unknown; quantitative analysis of human performance in concurrently conducted sensory, motor, and cognitive tasks, both in the presence and absence of tongue motions, is likely to bring about new scientific discoveries in human system integration. The PI's 3-D tongue tracking technology will also impact speech/language therapy, as well as the treatment of communication and sleep disorders that involve tongue motion. The PI will explore use of the BTCI technology in educational settings for children with special needs through programs such as Tools for Life, and will also conduct outreach efforts to expose K-12 students to facts about the CNS, its associated impairments, and different ways to address those problems with engineering solutions.