Making Waves With Your Brain!!!! Nick Carter 1-27-2016 This presentation is made for free educational purposes.

Your Brain is Electrical! Your brain is made up of millions of NEURONS The neurons use chemicals and electricity to communicate with each other It takes a lot of energy The Brain takes 20% of the total body energy. 2/3 of that brain energy is used to help Neurons send electrical signals Brain cells use chemical reactions to make electricity EEGs* measure the external brain voltages so we can look at them * ElectroEncephaloGraphs

How do Brain cells make Electricity? Do they have batteries? Batteries make electricity using chemical reactions that make extra electrons at one terminal and a need for electrons at the other terminal creating a voltage difference between the terminals Materials like to stay neutral without extra electrons or missing electrons Conductive wires make an easy path for electrons to travel from the terminal with extra to the terminal without enough As the electrons travel, they transfer energy to other things they pass through like motors, phones and light bulbs People make batteries using chemicals that make the most power – chemicals often poisonous to humans But brain cells…………………….. Wire

But what about Brain cells? Brain cells also use chemical reactions to make electricity Brains do not have wires so they use human friendly chemicals to send electricity through the cells. A neuron sends electricity using a pulse of IONs (charged chemicals - rather than the electrons themselves) to where it touches another neuron at a synapse. The electric pulse makes a chemical called a neurotransmitter go to the next neuron. If the next neuron gets enough neurotransmitters it will make an electrical pulse to send towards the next one. http://www.bris.ac.uk/synaptic/basics/basics-2.html https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/synapse.html http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/understanding-the-transmission-of-nerve-impulses.html http://www.cyh.com/HealthTopics/HealthTopicDetailsKids.aspx?p=335&np=152&id=2612

Received neurotransmitter chemicals make new electrical signals Electrical signal pulses make neurotransmitter chemicals cross to the other neuron Received neurotransmitter chemicals make new electrical signals Enough new electrical signals sensed makes an electrical pulse go - Electrical signal pulses  New Electrical signal pulses 

Brain Waves Brain Waves are electrical signals detected on the outside of your brain They result from the total average electrical activity inside your brain You cannot get a shock from them, they are very small voltages The signals change in size at regular intervals between 1/10 and 60 times a second depending how active the brain is.

Brain Wave Pulse Rate Matches How Active your Brain is Delta waves – when unconscious or asleep 1/10 to 4 pulses a second Theta waves – when conscious but sleepy 4 to 7 pulses a second Alpha waves – when relaxing physically and mentally 7 to 13 pulses a second Beta waves -- when actively alert, tense or agitated 13 to 60 pulses a second

The MindFlex Game uses Brainwaves to Control Objects. The Headset measures the Brain electrical signals and separates the different waves out It uses the signals to sense how focused you are. These signals are sent wirelessly to the base unit to control the ball or the fan position in the game.

We can see the signals it measures “Frontier Nerds” made a hack to see the Wave Signal Sizes PC using their Processing App. Serial/USB cable Parsed based on Neurosky mindset communications protocol Samples move this way at 1/Sec PC Display Bar Graph Values of Current Sample http://arduinoz.blogspot.com/search/label/eeg%20arduino%20mindflex http://developer.neurosky.com/docs/doku.php?id=mindset_data_types http://developer.neurosky.com/docs/doku.php?id=thinkgear_communications_protocol