Defense-related insights and solutions from neuroscience and neuroengineering.

Communication of intent usually requires motor function, which can be limiting during military missions. Determining a soldier's intent from brain signals rather than using muscles would have numerous applications for tactical combat. Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) translate brain signals into machine readable form and could optimize a soldier's interaction with the surrounding environment. However, current BCI devices have largely remained laboratory curiosities, because current techniques either require extended training or do not have the requisite signal fidelity, because they are highly invasive and thus not safe or practical for use in humans, or because they rely on equipment (such as magnetic resonance imaging scanners) that do not allow for real-time applications and/or field deployment. The objective of our research program is to create a prototype of a system for communication and monitoring of orientation that uses brain signals to provide, in real time, an accurate assessment of the users intentional focus and imagined speech. We expect that our efforts will provide a prototype of the first intuitive brain-based communication and orientation system for human use.