Brain-computer-interface based automatic control of robo-rat using a-star

Abstract

Robots have been applied to the tasks which are not appropriate for human; for examples dangerous, tough, dirty tasks or the tasks which require high accuracy, good repeatability, quick motion. Nowadays, rescue robots are applied to explore unknown areas or even to rescue victims after disasters because of their several superior performances over human. Due to flexibility and intelligent limitation of robots, they cannot be applied efficiently in complicated situations; such as search and rescue of survivals in collapsed structures after big disasters. Hence, the concept of animal robot was proposed by scientists and researchers to overcome limitations of the traditional robots. Recently, results of the researches on robo-animals which are controlled by stimulating of certain brain sites are successful. Shimoyama et al.,1 from the University of Tokyo developed a remote-control cockroach.1 Research on Robo-rat was accomplished by Talwar et al.,3 from New York University.2,3 Hirotaka et al.,4 could control the wings and related behaviors of beetles by implanting electrical electrodes on the beetles’ brains and muscles.4 It is widely known that brain machine interface (BMI) has a variety of advantages. There are large number of BMI applications; such as in medical services and in neuroscience researches. Basically, electrodes are used for electrical stimulating by connecting cables between the stimulators and the electrodes that are implanted to animal brain. The tethered stimulation does not only restrict the freedom of animal movement but also distract its attention. In order to solve the problem, tele-stimulation systems was employed to transmit stimulation signal via wireless communication.3 The telestimulation system should be small and light to avoid distraction of animal movement. In this paper, the brain computer interface on Robo-rat is proposed.