Corinthians Countree is a member

of the Deep Computing Institute of

IBM Research. She holds a
doctorate
from The Volgenau School of
Information Technology and
Engineering
George Mason University and is the
director of the Blue Brain Computer
Interface project.
Blue Brain
Computer
Interface
Life Magazine invited me to provide a photo
journal of my experience of our BCI. The
headlines were “Michael J. Fox returns to
acting with the aid of the motion of his invisible
tail”, the save of Disney Quest, and the World
prepared its pilgrimage to see what the fuss
was about. I cordially accepted and I present it
to you.
I wanted a niche at IBM Deep Computing. With
the BCI, Brain Computer Interface, you don't
know the relationship between what the
electrode reads outside the brain and what the
brain is actually doing. What we do know is the
signal decreases as the motor activity
increases.
The first level to beat is not of mining the data
but rather of acquiring the data. Motion capture
is noisy for the electrode. There is equipment
that can operate beyond the “noises off” zone,
however, muscles can't be quieted. Or can
they? Lucid dreamers can execute moves
during REM, Rapid Eye Movement, sleep. It is
not a job for a prospector. It is a job for an
Indiana Jones: once the treasure has been
hunted down, the challenge is getting it out and
getting it out quick. This level of the game
factors time; the time it takes the eye to rotate
significantly. Here is the need for super
computing. It all was an undertaking that
proved in the end to be surmountable.
How our BCI operates is simple.
• You are given images as quick as the eye
works in a virtual immersion as if you were
moving around. The brain starts up with the
same activity to a lesser degree as when the
body actually moves.
• You take control of your actions and our
read-only BCI kicks in.
We immediately discovered that this moving
around in our head does not just go away. It is
distinct and it is a familiar thing from being a
part of our dreams. The first time one of us got
antsy for what ever reason, we internalized it
and soon discovered that the body showed its
acceptance of this inward moving by remaining
outwardly still. And when muscle activity is
completely involuntary?
Me (l.) with Michael J. Fox and
National Center for Voice and
Speech research associate
Cynthia Fox (no relation).
I visit Tom Reiss. He is one of those whose
walk is very much challenged by movement
disorder. He developed glasses that
superimposed certain images onto what is
normally seen which serves to correct much of
the difficulties walking.
Puppeteers know how to operate tails and
extra arms and legs and video gamers are the
modern versions. But what we found was
something else entirely. We have a real tail
with its own electrode numbered positions in
the eeg array equivalent to areas on the motor-
sensory brain homunculus. Another suprise
was a phantom body full of sensations!
Is our BCI a Pandora's box? There are those
who wish they never opened it. They just can't
take off The Red Shoes and put them away.
Record breaking speed reading is the return.
I am in attendance
of the speed
reading world
champion, a little
Nigerian girl.
What does the
future hold for their
Speed reading
secretaries?
Giving the autistic another way to go inward is
problematic. I get into the spirit of things for a
test of the autistics reaction to facial
expressions.
The frozen akinetic, like those in the movie
Awakenings, can find their way back with the
help of our BCI. However; just as the drug
cure, they do revert. Hook them back into the
BCI and they come back.
University of Alabama Spain Rehabilitation
Center finds lasting fixes. There I visit Chris
Wilson who suffered head injuries that left him
akinetic.
The rehabilitation of those with Locked-in
syndrome launched the development of BCI.
Reducing the computational cost is the primary
goal of our team now, and a home version of
our BCI is hopefully on the horizon. Once the
Locked-in rediscover moving by internalization,
their performance is much improved on the
available portable BCI.
I visit Alla Sheffer at British Columbia to
discuss our BCI as an animators motion
capture device. I am reminded of “surreal
images of red meat animals moving as white
meat” a quote from my Dad the animator.
People who purposely explore the possibilities
of lucid dreaming oneironauts (from the Greek
ονειροναύτες, meaning "dream sailors").
The Sleep Diagnostics Center at Greenview
Regional Hospital South Central Kentucky.
Dana Alliance and Brain Science
Immunology
Los Alamos New Mexico coming from the
National Laboratory I stopped by the Santa Fe
Korean Presbyterian Church. A cousin is
preaching, I havn't seen him since we were
kids. Sung Chan Jun and I are introduced.
Sung Chan Jun is also at Los Alamos, small
world. I don’t remember exactly how but we
got into a discussion on Human Brain Mapping
Brain Topography Integration on Brain imaging
data Multimodality of MEG/EEG and fMRI
data.
Q“How about that Blue Brain?” A“Actually,
strictly speaking spatiotemporally…”
Due to the way they operate, MRI fMRI EEG
respectively “expose” the neural image at
different speeds. MRI is a true peek inside the
skull. The EEG image on the other hand has
no spatial definition other than electrode
position. What the EEG has however is the
potential for the high speed of powerboost
fame down loading.
I ‘m Information Technology slash Internet
Security and Accessability with a minor in
Interfacing, emphasis on speed of processing.
So…
Face facing and foot blogging in Big Blue inner
circling made a guest list included the likes of
Elad Yom-Tov and Michal Rosen-Zvi
(Schreiber) Machine Learning Group Haifa
Research Lab, Ted Selker USER System
Ergonomics Lab IBM Almaden Reserach
Center, and, some good faces at IBM Human-
Computer Interaction.
In the 80s brain wave extraordinaire Jonathan
R. Wolpaw, IBM, and the New York State
Department of Health, began a joint project to
develop new ways of using computers to
assist people with disabilities in an effort to
develop an EEG-based brain-computer
interface system.
Dear BCI launching smarter interfacing
precedent setting IBM.
Don’t you want a Big Brain what puts the
kinetic in ckinematc, something truly to
behold in this graphic online immersive age?
Don’t you want to finish what you started?
Marketability you say? Well…
Did I get a audience with the king? Boy did I,
eventually, speaking simile.
On meeting Sung Chan Jun, I had the idea
that Blue Brain was a brain mapping project.
Actually, it takes the map and from its' basis
builds a simulation.
Henry Markram, is the director of the Blue
Brain Project and the founder of the Brain
Mind Institute at the Ecole Polytechnique
Fédérale de Lausanne.
He is a major player on the brain machine
scene.
With downloading speeds records victory
dancing in my head I didn't at first understand
how “The Brain will be portrayed by Blue
Brain” approach contributed to an actual
realtime interface. I wouldn't be detered from
the fast track. “Oh Henry?!...
Landing at New
Zealand University of
Canterbury Human
Interface Technology
Laboratory,
I find treasure;
stereoscopic glasses
able to scan and
project images onto a
printed page.
I model The
Lumus PD-20
fitted with Light-
guide Optical
Element.
Me in a
dramatization of the
next logical step
contacts featuring
nanotech and tech
going down
pathways which
could eventually
lead to cloaking
devices. Courtesy of
Defense Advanced
Research Projects
Agency, DARPA.
“Full Metal” display
comes helmet
mounted at
OptronicsRockwell
Collins.
The helmet can
mount the dense
array eeg. BCI
DARPA style.
At Toshiba: It is the
coming of a new era
of VR with buddy
system “I'm going in”
“ I got you covered”
Total Immersion.
Touring Disney
Quest I inspect the
equipment.
With all the assumed equipment plus super
computing facilities, look at the expense facing
Disney. The Jurrasic Park Factor takes into
account that everone will come through, and
some over and over.