Scenario Screen: A Dynamic and Context Dependent P300 Stimulator Screen Aimed at Wheelchair Navigation Control

P300 spellers have been widely modified to implement nonspelling tasks. In this work, we propose a “scenario” stimulation screen that is a P300 speller variation to command a wheelchair. Our approach utilized a stimulation screen with an image background (scenario snapshot for a wheelchair) and stimulation markers arranged asymmetrically over relevant landmarks, such as suitable paths, doors, windows, and wall signs. Other scenario stimulation screen features were green/blue stimulation marker color scheme, variable Interstimulus Interval, single marker stimulus mode, and optimized stimulus sequence generator. Eighteen able-bodied subjects participated in the experiment; 78% had no experience in BCI usage. A waveform feature analysis and a Mann–WhitneyUtest performed over the pairs of target and nontarget coherent averages confirmed that 94% of the subjects elicit P300 (p<.005) on this modified stimulator. Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator optimization and Linear Discriminant Analysis were utilized for the automatic detection of P300. For evaluation with unseen data, target detection was computed (median sensitivity = 1.00 (0.78–1.00)), together with nontarget discrimination (median specificity = 1.00 (0.98–1.00)). The scenario screen adequately elicits P300 and seems suitable for commanding a wheelchair even when users have no previous experience on the BCI spelling task.

Carotid and aortic baroreflexes of the rat: I. Open-loop steady-state properties and blood pressure variability

To characterize the baroreflex in central nervous system-intact neuromuscular-blocked rats, we measured the vascular and cardiac responses and compared direct stimulation of the aortic depressor nerve (ADN) with a capacitance electrode (differentially activating either A or A + C fibers) to carotid sinus pressure with a micro-balloon (SINUS). One-thousand-two-hundred-ninety-seven open-loop measurements of systolic blood pressure (SBP), heart rate, venous pressure (VBP), and mesenteric (msBF), femoral (fmBF), and skin (skBF) blood flow were completed; the linear range of the effects was determined for each response and stimulus mode. The rats were sinoaortic denervated (SAD). The open-loop stimulation effect was very stable; e.g., the mean effect of 790 ADN stimulations during >7 days was −9.8 mmHg, with an average drift of +0.001 mmHg/h. In contrast, there was large variability of the SBP baseline (e.g., SD = ±10.9), which was due to SAD (±6.3 to ±16.3 mmHg, t = −13.9, df = 4, P < 0.0002) and was reversed by ganglionic block (±10.8 to ± 2.9 mmHg, t = −12.9, df = 3, P < 0.001). The ADN stimuli produced larger depressor responses than sinus stimuli (−66 vs. −45 mmHg); all component responses paralleled the magnitude of the SBP effect, except interbeat interval (IBI), for which the ADN ΔIBI was ≈10 times that of SINUS. For all stimuli, fmBF increased and msBF did not. Mesenteric and femoral vascular conductance both increased, whereas VBP decreased and skBF followed SBP. We found that for all baroreflex response components, with the exception of SINUS-elicited ΔIBI, there was an orderly, substantially linear, relationship between stimulus strength and response magnitude.