The dorsolateral pre‑frontal cortex bi‑polar error‑related potential in a locked‑in patient implanted with a daily use brain–computer interface

While brain computer interfaces (BCIs) offer the potential of allowing those suffering from loss of muscle control to onceagain fully engage with their environment by bypassing the affected motor system and decoding user intentions directly frombrain activity, they are prone to errors. One possible avenue for BCI performance improvement is to detect when the BCI userperceives the BCI to have made an unintended action and thus take corrective actions. Error-related potentials (ErrPs) areneural correlates of error awareness and as such can provide an indication of when a BCI system is not performing accordingto the user’s intentions. Here, we investigate the brain signals of an implanted BCI user suffering from locked-in syndrome(LIS) due to late-stage ALS that prevents her from being able to speak or move but not from using her BCI at home on adaily basis to communicate, for the presence of error-related signals. We first establish the presence of an ErrP originatingfrom the dorsolateral pre-frontal cortex (dLPFC) in response to errors made during a discrete feedback task that mimics theclick-based spelling software she uses to communicate. Then, we show that this ErrP can also be elicited by cursor movementerrors in a continuous BCI cursor control task. This work represents a first step toward detecting ErrPs during the dailyhome use of a communications BCI.     

The dorsolateral pre-frontal cortex bi-polar error-related potential in a locked-in patient implanted with a daily use brain-computer interface

While brain computer interfaces(BCIs)offer the potential of allowing those suffering from loss of muscle control to once again fully engage with their environme...