Brain-computer interfaces for basic neuroscience

Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a powerful new tool for basic neuroscience investigators. This is because the BCI approach forges a tight link between the observation of neural activity and well-controlled manipulations of neural activity, driven by the BCI user's own volition. As in all branches of science, progress in neuroscience rests on observation and manipulation. In neuroscience, our observations are typically measurements of neural activity and behavior, and our manipulations are lesions and the addition of neural activity through direct neural stimulation, which cause changes in behavior and in the activity of other neurons. A BCI links observation and manipulation directly because the participant in the experiment observes a mapping of his or her own neural activity, and through volitional control, manipulates that activity. Researchers employing the BCI approach in a basic neuroscience context have made new progress toward understanding the neural basis of motor control, learning, and cognition. To date, most of the basic research using the BCI approach has been applied to understanding the motor system, but future basic science research objectives using the BCI approach include the neural basis of cognitive and emotional function, and explorations of the computational limits of neural circuitry.