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By the way, yeah, Fatto Fox works
on a ETG classification,
which is that thing way they measure the
like the electricity in
how what's the proper definition of it,
by the way? They do something, something
with with electricity that
is going on in your brain.
And yeah,
he's into neurofeedback research
and there's software for noninvasive
computer vision based wildlife
identification, which is a very cool
thing, I believe.
Yeah. This was your biography in a couple
of sentences made very, very badly.
Anyway. Yeah, so.
Oh, hello.
Oh, perfect. OK, yeah, so
please give him a big round of applause
for his.
Yeah, thank you.
Thank you for joining the session.
Yeah, I put some
crappy description of what I'm actually
doing. So the wife thing is actually a
separate project.
So what I'm basically doing, A,
B, C, I research and.
Yeah, and so this is what I actually want
to talk about because recently I felt
like I was waking up in
the future. I mean, because we have all
this new technology right now happening
like rejuvenating cells.
What is of open
open like driving cars, self-driving
cars, everything, just
like it's tangible almost.
And so now we have
brain computer interfaces and
also made available and
to the point where you can say it becomes
reliable, actually.
And yeah.
So but of course, always with new
technology, there might be some people
who want to misuse it.
And so that's a great responsibility
coming.
And so I know this place here,
I find probably the most progressive
people around technology.
And that's why I want to
share this update, actually update
on the progress that
we did already last year with
Mittermeier and Massager and.
Yeah. All right.
So let's get started.
So, yeah, this is basically where
we want to head.
OK, so what?
Yeah, I know a lot of people probably
know something about our know maybe
a lot about PCI, but I have to be
fair and just give a little introduction
first.
So for the people don't know.
And yet
then I will talk of course about the
things that actually
are going to be relevant
and also give a view of the
consumer devices that are currently
available and all the open source
approaches right now.
And OK, so
here we go there with me.
This is just the basics right now.
I try to keep it short.
So what is edgy?
Edgy is basically it's
electroencephalography.
You have this you have
this beautiful plot
here. The this is actually
what we can measure on the surface of the
head. And that's what
Hansberger and the 20s found
out you can do with humans.
So he put electrodes and somebody
is closing the eyes and then he opens it
and you have a totally different pattern
of brainwaves. And
so, yes, a noninvasive brain
imaging method. And it's probably,
yeah, one of the
best known sort of say and.
OK. And so, yeah, this is like maybe
a typical.
So you have like Electra's
and you place them in a certain, uh,
certain areas that correlate of cost
to brain activity and, uh, different
areas of the brain.
And then you get this signal.
And so basically it's
you can interpret it as how many times
a second, uh, does a wave go up and
down? And then you can do
an analysis on this.
You have the frequency analysis, for
instance. That's something that's
been done quite often, actually.
Um.
And so what else can you
do? You can do the unmixed the signal
and then you, for instance, have you can
determine the arousal state like.
So how awake are you?
Are you almost falling asleep
or did you just have, like, a bunch of
coffee and.
Yeah. Like this kind of scale, you can
we can see here, this is the typical
scale.
Of course, there's lots of different
activity of
and.
Yeah. So basically we can do so much more
actually with this
combination, also with machine learning
of course. And so
but let's just have a slight
definition here, just so
you can see, like the basic
difference of
how we can operate actually a brain
computer interface. So like this is.
Ha!
So this was the end of it, no
joke, yeah.
Hello.
OK. All right, perfect.
So, yeah, OK, so like three
basic, what a
way to differentiate.
We have a.
a. uh uh, brain computer
interface where you, for instance,
think about your left or right hand and
of course, need some training.
And then, uh, uh, yes, you can
directly control the device.
I thought that's one approach.
Then you have reactive we show circle
stimulus. That means so
you show something like maybe, uh,
um, something visual or something
auditory and, uh, you have a certain
reaction and then
also a passive one.
Those are the ones that you probably
won't notice, much less kind of
tweaking your user experience.
Um, and so you probably won't even notice
them. And uh, yeah.
So this like a very basic, uh,
very basic, um.
Circuitry of brain computer interfaces
where you have the user and then you have
the electrodes, we do amplification.
I mean, this is a very simplified
approach right now than the filter any
converter. And then we send it to
a software, we do some preprocessing
because, of course, we also have a lot of
noise in the data.
Then we really looked for the data
that we can use the feature extraction
and then we have some machine learning
algorithms that can
run a command based on the
interpretation.
And so.
Yeah, so as I said, so
it really depends on where I put the
electrodes and there are so many
possibilities actually here and this is
only a crude map, of course.
So, for instance,
spending computers, something
very nice, I think.
So you just see maybe a screen with all
the with the alphabet.
And so the letter you're thinking
of, maybe the line is then highlighted
and so we can measure
actually this is then the
letter you're thinking of is actually the
target stimulus here in this
P300 scheme.
And then this is like
a different reaction.
We can really measure this to
anything else, like anything that's not
the letter right now thinking of.
And of course. Yes.
So maybe it's already part of the videos
where people are can
actually control by thoughts,
exoskeletons and prosthetics
and.
Yeah, so and next, something that's
also now very popular for
the commercial consumer
product system and neurofeedback.
And so what is basically
is you can learn, you
can really train your brainwave
activity.
And and
so the way it works is you we
constantly measure actually your the
brainwave data. Then we do the processing
and we have an interpretation.
Is this going nearer to the
state of wellbeing you want
to be? Maybe then we give up in this
moment, we give a reward.
So of this,
the reward is a sound.
And then you say like, oh, OK, that was
the sound.
This is great. And if your brain tries to
reproduce the sound, so in the same
time you're changing your brainwave
activity and
your breath, some simple example
examples, the more maybe for clinical and
medical use, of course.
But yeah.
So that's the Hecky thing.
Of course, you don't have to be sick to
use neurofeedback. You can still optimize
your brain wave activity and.
Yeah, so in the not so far, this is
the nice thing, it's easier
than ever to make an interactive
installation where
you can have an audio visual
feedback, maybe
you can design it.
It's just the nuances of your arousal
state and also maybe in combination
with somebody you're doing it together
with. So it's a whole new
it's a new experience, something new
that you can really feel.
So I tried. So we did I did a
similar setup
at a festival
and it was quite interesting with two
people. And I
can really say it's something special.
And yeah, for some.
Sorry, really worth trying.
And so then Eurogamer.
So this is basically the gamification of
neurofeedback.
So also there was the second
conference and you were gaming already in
San Francisco this year.
Um, OK.
And then there's this new approach,
not so new approach, but now new approach
and consumer the consumer
landscape is to combine
EEG or to use TC's
transcranial direct current stimulation
or transcranial
alternating current stimulation,
which is basically
zapping your brain.
The problem is there's not much
there's no long term study so
far. I mean, people say it's nice.
Say, wow, I feel
like I drank a bunch of coffees and I'm
so active. OK, but
I don't know.
Can you can you do with something that
less is not so sure.
So there are some scientists who
say, yeah, you can
try it out, but you should be careful
definitely what you're doing, you should
be knowing what you're doing.
OK, so maybe just give a quick overview
of the methods.
This is not all of them.
This is just the ones I find
interesting. Here is the P300.
That was the one where you respond
to a, uh, to a certain
stimulus, the target stimulus and the
spare computer, for instance.
And there's no learning involved really.
Then we at the steady state visually,
visually evoked potentials.
This is where you can, for instance, have
a blinking light and a certain frequency
and you will have
you can actually read this in the
hospital. So your visual cortex
would have a certain response to this.
And so this is also maybe an
example of a reactive
BCI. Then we have potentials.
Some are motor imagery.
This is, again, the active one.
And yeah, this is.
Yeah, also quite a
good one, um, so,
OK, let's
let's just have a quick look at the
consumer devices right now.
And first,
OK, we should clarify, what are we
looking for? What what would be the
criteria to say this is a good device.
This is bad device?
Um, so I just sort of a
few points, of course, depending on what
you want to do, they might be different.
Um, so but of course the first thing
is cost.
I mean, so maybe don't want to
waste fifty thousand dollars
and then say oh wow. OK, um I
can control, make a robot go in the
circle and the other one and
fifty thousand dollars.
So OK, maybe a little
less. And uh but
what's really important is the
specificity and the reliability.
So you don't want to buy some stuff in
and see.
Oh it's just a
it's not, it's in the data.
So like I mean you should ask yourself is
really brain wave coming out of this
thing? Um, so I'm not
going to point the finger at any
commercial product right now because I
only have ten.
But so like, um,
it's really it's really
something you want to look at.
It's really essential thing.
You want to have clear data,
a clean data and.
OK, so the next thing is the hardware and
software degrees of freedom.
So to say.
This is of course interesting for
Hecker's. I guess if you have the
chance to change some parts,
change electrodes.
And of course, what's also
essential then to have the raw data
access and, uh, and then ergonomics,
I mean, you don't want to waste ten
minutes trying to set up your
PCI device,
not maybe in thirty seconds.
That really sucks because like, every
time you want to try
and light it at some point
during the day and and then you
fiddle around the whole time and then
it's like it's a turn off.
You don't you don't want to deal with it
the whole time. Um, well,
of course you are, depending on what you
want to do.
So and then one important thing,
um, is the product safety
and security or safety.
I would say, of course you don't get
electrical, you don't get a shock from
the system. There's not that circuit
or something.
And security.
I will come to this later at one point.
Um, and, uh,
OK, so just yeah.
I know this is this is just a
few devices. I picked this now um
so to say.
Yeah. Just like the Yeah.
Right now popular ones.
But there are also other ones.
Of course if you do some research the
news came and wife is kind of um
I think popular,
does a good job and has good connection.
I mean it's easy to mount and uh
and they at least have a
white guy. It's it's nicer than the
motive.
I was working with two years, but I was
kind of epoque and
I was kind of a night to put this to
other people's head, actually, because,
yeah, if those people have
a lot of hair, you really sitting there
sometimes ten, twenty minutes and
the guy's asking like, what's happening?
I don't know. Nothing, nothing
really. Um, uh.
Yeah, I'm waiting for something.
Yeah. The electrodes.
Yeah. It's not really working.
Uh and uh yeah.
It's also again, as I said, a turn off.
Uh but I'm really uh
uh yeah. I'm curious about the inside.
I think it's uh uh actually
just launched in the Interex Muse also
looks like a legit headset.
Melun I put you. I couldn't
so they couldn't give me the data really.
But it's also very affordable.
Um.
All right, so, um,
OK, so what is the progress?
So if you look at the devices, they
all have dry electrodes.
I mean, it's not like it used to be.
You have to put gel to have good
conduct connectivity.
It's different now.
So like dry electrodes.
But the problem is you have to
make sure every.
You get a higher impedance and then
it's a very sensitive to to noise, you
can really get nice very easily.
So you have to think about the
design of your secretary.
And of course, the
agora and rhythms get better.
And it's
something that improves,
of course. But if the signal is
bad in the beginning,
sometimes there's not much you can do and
yet then you don't have a working DCI.
Actually, um.
OK, that was one of
the. OK, so then let's move on
to the open source, DIY,
um, and, uh,
so yeah.
So of course the time's a little bit too
short to to go in detail about
the hardware set up.
But we're glad you're going to help you
guys. If you come by.
We can talk and talk on
the details of the hardware
implementation. Really.
Um, but yeah.
And also I, I just
picked like a few devices.
Uh, again, that's
a project that I'd have
like a tutorial how to do a device
for yourself or that already offer maybe
like a kit or something that you can
really start doing it,
doing BCI.
Um, OK.
So, um,
just understand the
project. I think it has been and
it's quite popular. This has been online
for a long time on the first page
and they're doing a really
good job. They also have a lot of
tutorials there.
And um, so and then they say it's like
something between two hundred
dollars to have to put the device by
yourself. But then you also have a
company that basically, um,
assembled this all in the box.
Um, and uh
and then you probably
also heard about the dot com project.
This is where you
can 3D print also um,
the PCI
device and uh and
you have a different
approach, also more electrons,
but it's like one with four.
Um, and then the open PCI
dot org, the one that comes from
from retirement and Masahiko and
uh, with over 30 years of
research and this is
not one
that can be stacked and, uh,
a lot of electrodes and we
can be used either with Arduino,
uh, you know, or you can use basically
you can exchange also the microcontroller
here. Um,
but yeah. What is the
the core difference.
What is why what.
You either pick the one or the other.
So again, it really depends on
what you're planning to do.
Is that something you want to do at home,
some simple setup or you want to make,
uh, research, low budget research, sort
of say you want to have, um, holistic
recording with a lot of electrodes.
Um, so do you have to think about
that? But, um, so like
maybe one core difference is also the
aid converter that has a huge impact for
the brain to, you know, so you can use
it, uh, actually better
with dry electrodes.
Um, so yeah, it's,
it's more um it's actually
easier to start with it due to
the set up and um.
Yeah. OK, um, just maybe then a few words
to the electrodes because this is the
thing that you cannot um,
I mean you didn't have for the consumer
devices.
Um but like with um.
With Hecate devices, you can really
just say, OK, I want this or that,
the very, um, something
that is also in the scientific
realm, if you have to like a
standard, is the electrodes,
which are like a cup and they're
basically the materials, something
supercold or tin.
Then you have big differences,
passive and active electrodes.
So passive means
I just make electrodes
and then of course, maybe over wire and
then you have the amplification.
But on the way, it's a problem
that you can maybe get some signals.
Also because of electromagnetic
fields, for instance, the active
electrode on the opposite is you
amplify the signal right
after the electrode and
which makes a better contact, then a
better signal.
Um, OK, and then also
something very new. You have bendable
electrodes, I saw publication and I think
this also coming up.
So something is very ergonomic
and yeah, of course.
And also you can you can have
electrodes.
You can just take some silver coins and
soldered them to a screw and then
connect. It works perfect.
Yeah, OK.
And then software.
So I only also picked a few
of course, and there's much more,
but like open like is one of those that's
quite uh
has been there for a long time also.
And do you have a visual editor
and you have all the machine learning and
all the filters there also.
And like a lot of tools
and your brain based also
unfortunately for windows, but
then your new software,
it's not open source, but it's
free to use.
Um, so yeah.
But I would suggest for the beginning or
you have maybe some other two boxes for,
for Matlab if you do it like the research
field.
But open VIPR is always a good thing to
go I think at the beginning.
And so one important thing I want
to talk about, um.
Is privacy issues.
Maybe this feels like it's an early
stage, but if you think about it, if
if brain computer interfaces become
more popular, like, you know, you
used to be like Fitbit maybe or something
like that, and now it's you quantified
the body. No, you quantified the mind and
become popular.
Then you should ask yourself
what happens with my data, with my
brainwave data, because
there's actually some things that you can
do with it and.
Yeah, so let's just take a look
at those titles here,
so the headlines and
brainwave privacy standard is needed to
prevent spying on each state has its own
data.
Researchers one.
OK, boffins
proposed brainwave privacy standard EU
data can predict illness
and app makers are storing it in the
cloud.
I think, wow, that's shit.
I don't what that that's really something
I want to prevent.
So I think it's.
It's a critical time that
we should actually get
and get
conversation and to discuss
this really because, um,
yeah, I don't know where this this could
be heading. I mean, I'm not overly
paranoid, but as you can imagine,
there's a lot of things you can really
use here, misuse.
And yeah.
So basically something about health
conditions, cognitive performance.
And then, of course, there was also a
publication of talking about
achieving with the consumer device
they found of the PIN code was the first
location where people you actually know.
So all this data can be actually
compromised.
And yeah, so you have different
stages of attack.
And of course
what we can do is with the open
source community, we can course
look, if if there's something maybe
around the device, maybe
we can check out, we can do a
encrypt the brainwave data before we send
it. But OK,
now it's going to be hard anyways, but we
should discuss about it and.
And, uh, yeah, so.
Um, so, again, I would say
it is really something essential
and something we that should be
discussed and.
And then, yeah, so,
um, then this is something
that of where I
really want to also that's why I'm here
also to discuss with you guys
if there's some
approach that.
We can make a safer
brainwave experience in the future,
and, yeah, so,
um, just come back by the European
space and yeah,
we can discuss. You can try out the
device. We have a lot of devices there
from all sorts of, um,
all the consumer of the
opensource device we listed are actually
there and um.
Yeah. Try out on
test and then if you want, if you want to
hack something that'll
help you and
answer all your questions and.
Yeah. Again, as I said. So maybe
you also have a good input for um
so we can kind of go on with the
privacy of data and
then also for the for the brain
to projects, there's going to be a
Kickstarter. We want to make it more
affordable.
Um, also if you want to participate,
um.
Yeah, just come by again,
um, yeah, but that's basically
it.
Thank you for listening.
OK.
Oh, yeah, right, yeah, there is already
a question from the Internet, so please
go.
Thank you. First question, do you
know of any plans to regulate the whole
technology devices that send
waves and have the capability
to, you know, tamper with your brain
and shouldn't maybe be easily to
to be allowed?
Yeah, I'm not sure.
I mean, the problem is sometimes you
I mean, the consumer market then.
So, like, OK, I will repeat
the question.
So it's the only way to to
make your shut up.
OK,
so is there any approach.
So I would say the problem is always the
disclaimer like
mouse like very small print
of things.
And then you're not sure if you're a
consumer of a you know, if you're
buying consumer product.
So from that point, it's
quite hard, I think, to to regulate
at this point.
But yeah, I don't know if that
would be like a standard like
a data standards
and safety standards and maybe
this could be done. But of course,
there's so many steps where
you can attack this, actually.
So, yeah, it's it's quite a complicated
topic.
Know
there is a question on the microphone
whether you had this
light at the beginning where you outlined
the basic flow of the data when it,
uh, first it was analog
taken from the brain, then, uh, changed
to dialog data and
digital. Sorry.
Um, and, uh,
there was a filtering process before
that. My question is, is there
a direct, uh,
advantage of filtering the data before
changing it to digital data?
And what sort of filtering is done there,
or is it just a bad pass or is there
something else?
Um, that actually, um.
So, I mean, this was quite simplified,
graphic, because we have
also, uh, different kind of amplifiers
before our instrumental.
Um, but
um.
Yeah. So, um,
does it make sense before you sort of um
further um but
maybe if you have the time maybe
you can come around and we can show you,
um, like some detailed
schematics actually and try to explain
why, why this makes sense at this point.
Um, but yeah.
Also, I mean if you, if you don't wanna
come by, it's all online.
I can show. Um.
Yeah.
Um.
Um, um,
to my left.
Hello.
No, there is a question in there.
Hello. Uh, about the
Ã‰poque headset, uh,
there was a small bullet point mentioning
that it has, uh, raw data hack.
Could you please elaborate?
Uh.
Um, yeah.
I mean, I'm not sure of
this. I mean, yeah.
I mean, if you if you look at
a search engine, you can I mean, it's
quite easy to find, um,
it's also and get up there some folks off
it and um.
Yeah, it's actually quite easy
to use. Um but
yeah.
It's possible.
Yeah.
Hello.
You were talking about the
dangers and the misuse that can be
done with it, the dangers and the misuse
that can be done with it, with the
system, and there
will be misuse, you know, that will come.
Yeah, I mean, it's part of it.
So how as a scientist, do you
have to work with that?
You know, you on the one hand, you
clearly know that it's good and all
the good things that come out of it.
On the other hand, it's a very, very
powerful technique, technique.
I think people should be able
to decide by themselves if they want to
share their brainwave data or not.
And every action I do before this,
I want to make sure 100 percent that
cannot be compromised.
Um, I think that would be
like maybe some opt in if you can say,
OK, I'm fine.
I put my raw data online
in the cloud. They can use it for
analysis, for like cloud analysis.
Yes, definitely. It's a it's a powerful
tool.
But yeah, I think it should be opt in.
There should be no compromising before
that step.
Do you also believe that it will
sometimes, you know, in our society, we
we have the brain and the heart, you
know, and we take separate it.
I don't know why, but this happens.
Do you think it will lead to us
getting brain and heart closer together
again?
I mean, once, you know, sometimes you
don't know what you're feeling, you know,
you can't describe it.
Do you think that that whole technique
can help?
Well, I mean, so basically, I mean,
how I think about neurofeedback, for
instance, is it's like meditation with
guidance. So
like all the like
the research also going on with
meditation, you know, kind of
bring into the call what what does it
really do, what how it changes your
brain with chemicals really and
in a profound way.
And I mean, what
with this I mean, what's
following this is that, um,
you become more aware, of course,
of your surroundings. So maybe in a way,
this this brings this
brings close together and the mind
sort of say, um.
Yeah, yeah.
So there is a question to
the microphone at my right.
I think, um, BCI is quite interesting,
but since it's an interface,
I'm interested in whether there are any
methods of inducing brainwaves
instead of just measuring them.
Imagine a world in which you think of
something and I am a Wikipedia article
directly in your brain.
Quite interesting.
Um, yeah. So this is the
um. I mean, there are different
approaches right now noninvasively.
But in a way it is invasive.
You have the topics.
Um but I
mean so
the problem is you don't have like long
term research on this.
You can you can be your own guinea pig.
Of course you can buy the devices
and just check it out what it
does. Um, but
so like this is like forcing brainwave
activity.
The other thing I mean, I try to explain
the neurofeedback is really it
takes some time.
But, um, there's like
depending on what protocol you're using,
you can regulate also you can change
brainwave activity.
And the great thing about it,
it stays the way it's so it's not like,
um, so like you're really building new
bridges in your brain.
I mean the same with TDE, but it's not
fast. And the problem with TCS also, it's
like very unspecific right
now at least it's like you're firing
in every direction and, um, changing
something forcefully.
Um, yeah.
Thank you. Um, there is time for one last
question from the signal Angel.
Thank you. My question from the Internet
goes along the lines of the last
question. Could you elaborate a little
bit on the brain wave training
part?
Um, what's the status?
Um, what are the benefits?
Yeah. So, I mean, it's use right now, um,
uh, for instance, to,
um, like aid like attention
deficit disorder.
Um, it's an alternative to to
Ritalin. I could tell you, you know,
that's like, um, basically it's an
amphetamine that they're giving to
children.
And, um, so it's very harmful for
the body.
Um, but instead you can do neurofeedback
training actually.
Um, and uh, so
I mean, of course you have to do some
practice and maybe you have to do also
some follow up practice.
But in the long run it helps
you with a situation and a very good
way also. And you don't have to take
chemicals.
Uh, I'm sorry for you guys, but we're
running out of time and I've got to cut
it short, so.
Yeah. Thanks a lot.
Yeah. Also, you can just come by.