Survey on Brain-Computer Interface

A brain-computer interface (BCI) provides a way to develop interaction between a brain and a computer. The communication is developed as a result of neural responses generated in the brain because of motor movements or cognitive activities. The means of communication here includes muscular and non-muscular actions. These actions generate brain activities or brain waves that are directed to a hardware device to perform a specific task. BCI initially was developed as the communication device for patients suffering from neuromuscular disorders. Owing to recent advancements in BCI devices—such as passive electrodes, wireless headsets, adaptive software, and decreased costs—it is also being used for developing communication between the general public. The BCI device records brain responses using various invasive and non-invasive acquisition techniques such as electrocorticography (ECoG), electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography (MEG), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). In this article, a survey on these techniques has been provided. The brain response needs to be translated using machine learning and pattern recognition methods to control any application. A brief review of various existing feature extraction techniques and classification algorithms applied on data recorded from the brain has been included in this article. A significant comparative analysis of popular existing BCI techniques is presented and possible future directives are provided.