Innovations in human neuroimaging tools have driven profound advances in our understanding
of brain function under well-controlled and constrained conditions. While we are gaining greater
understanding of how the brain functions in single-snapshot experiments under restricted lab
settings, we do not know how it works in dynamic, complex and multisensory real-world
environments.
The goal of this project is to build a portable, miniaturized, lightweight, high-density wearable
combined – functional Near Infrared-Spectroscopy (fNIRS) – Electro-Encepholography (EEG) -
Eye-tracking system for enabling “Neuroscience of the Everyday World (NEW)” by permitting long
duration continuous monitoring of normal / altered brain activity during movement, perception,
and social interaction in real time and in the real world. In Aim 1, We will (A) develop a wearable
and fully hybrid high-density EEG-fNIRS system that supports autonomous long-term recordings
(>6 hours), (B) develop combined and miniaturized active EEG-Electrodes / fNIRS-Optodes; and
(C) integrate the wearable system with Tobii Pro 2 eye-tracking/scene-camera glasses and state-
of-the-art computer vision for adaptive acquisition and automated data annotation. In Aim 2, we
will measure brain activity during walking, perceiving, and interacting, with experiments gradually
increasing in complexity through three phases from lab to real world settings in young healthy
adults and conduct a proof of principle in two sample clinical populations. In Aim 3, we will create
an analysis workflow for data collected in Aim 2 that will accomplish the following: (1) removing
nuisance signals from fNIRS/EEG signals, (2) analysis of multimodal fNIRS/EEG and behavioral
data, (3) automatic annotation of and adaptation for real world measurements.
This project brings together engineers, scientists and clinicians with the goal of building the next
generation of imaging tools to capture brain function in real time. With our technological
sophistication, interdisciplinary focus, and ready access to well-characterized clinical populations,
we are uniquely positioned to successfully develop, apply, and disseminate our NEW technology,
and lay down a foundation upon which groundbreaking advances in our understanding of the links
between brain activity and behavior will build.
