Probability Distributions.- Linear Models for Regression.- Linear Models for Classification.- Neural Networks.- Kernel Methods.- Sparse Kernel Machines.- Graphical Models.- Mixture Models and EM.- Approximate Inference.- Sampling Methods.- Continuous Latent Variables.- Sequential Data.- Combining Models.

Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning

Co-Planar Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Brain—3-Dimensional Proportional System: An Approach to Cerebral Imaging, J. Talairach, P. Tournoux. Georg Thieme Verlag, New York (1988), 122 pp., 130 figs. DM 268

I have developed "tennis elbow" from lugging this book around the past four weeks, but it is worth the pain, the effort, and the aspirin. It is also worth the (relatively speaking) bargain price. Including appendixes, this book contains 894 pages of text. The entire panorama of the neural sciences is surveyed and examined, and it is comprehensive in its scope, from genomes to social behaviors. The editors explicitly state that the book is designed as "an introductory text for students of biology, behavior, and medicine," but it is hard to imagine any audience, interested in any fragment of neuroscience at any level of sophistication, that would not enjoy this book. The editors have done a masterful job of weaving together the biologic, the behavioral, and the clinical sciences into a single tapestry in which everyone from the molecular biologist to the practicing psychiatrist can find and appreciate his or

Principles of Neural Science

Neuromotor prostheses (NMPs) aim to replace or restore lost motor functions in paralysed humans by routeing movement-related signals from the brain, around damaged parts of the nervous system, to external effectors. To translate preclinical results from intact animals to a clinically useful NMP, movement signals must persist in cortex after spinal cord injury and be engaged by movement intent when sensory inputs and limb movement are long absent. Furthermore, NMPs would require that intention-driven neuronal activity be converted into a control signal that enables useful tasks. Here we show initial results for a tetraplegic human (MN) using a pilot NMP. Neuronal ensemble activity recorded through a 96-microelectrode array implanted in primary motor cortex demonstrated that intended hand motion modulates cortical spiking patterns three years after spinal cord injury. Decoders were created, providing a ‘neural cursor’ with which MN opened simulated e-mail and operated devices such as a television, even while conversing. Furthermore, MN used neural control to open and close a prosthetic hand, and perform rudimentary actions with a multi-jointed robotic arm. These early results suggest that NMPs based upon intracortical neuronal ensemble spiking activity could provide a valuable new neurotechnology to restore independence for humans with paralysis. The cover shows Matt Nagle, first participant in the BrainGate pilot clinical trial. He is unable to move his arms or legs following cervical spinal cord injury. Researchers at the Department of Neuroscience at Brown University, working with biotech company Cyberkinetics and 3 other institutions, demonstrate that movement-related signals can be relayed from the brain via an implanted BrainGate chip, allowing the patient to drive a computer screen cursor and activate simple robotic devices. Such neuromotor prostheses could pave the way towards systems to replace or restore lost motor function in paralysed humans. Prior to this advance, this type of work has been performed chiefly in monkeys. The latest example of such research has achieved a large increase in speed over current devices, enhancing the prospects for clinically viable brain-machine interfaces.

Neuronal ensemble control of prosthetic devices by a human with tetraplegia

Over the past 20 years, neuroimaging has become a predominant technique in systems neuroscience. One might envisage that over the next 20 years the neuroimaging of distributed processing and connectivity will play a major role in disclosing the brain's functional architecture and operational principles. The inception of this journal has been foreshadowed by an ever-increasing number of publications on functional connectivity, causal modeling, connectomics, and multivariate analyses of distributed patterns of brain responses. I accepted the invitation to write this review with great pleasure and hope to celebrate and critique the achievements to date, while addressing the challenges ahead.

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Functional and effective connectivity: a review.

1 Institute of Neural Engineering, Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria, 2 BioTechMed Graz, Graz, Austria, 3 Intelligent Systems Research Centre, Ulster University, Derry, United Kingdom, 4 Inria Bordeaux Sud-Ouest/LaBRI (Univ. Bordeaux, CNRS, Bordeaux INP), Talence, France, 5 School of Information Science and Technology, East China of University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, China, Department of Cognition, Emotion, and Methods in Psychology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria

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Editorial: Long Term User Training and Preparation to Succeed in a Closed-Loop BCI Competition

User--Centric Performance Estimation in a Continuous Online BCI

A neuroprosthesis can restore movement functions of persons with spinal cord injury. It benefits from a brain-computer interface (BCI) with a high number of control classes. However, classical sensorimotor rhythm-based BCIs can often only provide less than 3 classes, and new types of BCIs need to be developed. We investigated whether low-frequency timedomain signals (i.e. movement-related cortical potentials [1]) can be used to classify hand/arm movements of the same limb. A BCI based on attempted movements may be used to control a neuroprosthesis more naturally and provide a higher number of control classes.

Decoding Movements of the Upper Limb from EEG

The consequences of a spinal cord injury (SCI) are tremendous for the patients. The loss of motor functions especially of the grasping function leads to a life-long dependency on helping persons and thereby to a dramatic decrease in quality of life. With the help of so-called neuroprostheses, the grasp function can be substantially improved. Nowadys, systems for grasp restoration can only be used by patients with preserved voluntary shoulder and elbow function. In patients with a higher SCI the ability to move the elbow is lost and the number of active control movements decreases. A Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) offers a method to overcome this problem. This work gives an overview of the Graz BCI used for the control of neuroprosthetic devices.

Graz Brain-Computer Interface: Control of neuroprostheses for the upper extremity

Electroencephalographic (EEG) correlates of movement have been studied extensively over many years. In the present work, we focus on investigating neural correlates that originate from the spine and study their connectivity to corresponding signals from the sensorimotor cortex using multivariate autoregressive (MVAR) models. To study cortico-spinal interactions, we simultaneously measured spinal cord potentials (SCPs) and somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs) of wrist movements elicited by neuromuscular electrical stimulation. We identified directional connections between spine and cortex during both the extension and flexion of the wrist using only non-invasive recording techniques. Our connectivity estimation results are in alignment with various studies investigating correlates of movement, i.e., we found the contralateral side of the sensorimotor cortex to be the main sink of information as well as the spine to be the main source of it. Both types of movement could also be clearly identified in the time-domain signals.

/pdf/measuring-spinal-cord-potentials-and-cortico-spinal-3uld5fqo.pdf

Gernot Müller-Putz

Papers

Editorial: Long Term User Training and Preparation to Succeed in a Closed-Loop BCI Competition

User--Centric Performance Estimation in a Continuous Online BCI

Decoding Movements of the Upper Limb from EEG

Graz Brain-Computer Interface: Control of neuroprostheses for the upper extremity

Measuring Spinal Cord Potentials and Cortico-Spinal Interactions After Wrist Movements Induced by Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation