The hair brush that reads your mind
From: EurekAlert - 10/19/2010

Novel 'brush optrode' improves brain imaging 

One of the main techniques for measuring and monitoring mental activity,
called functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), can often be impaired
because a person's hair gets in the way. But now, thanks to a team of
researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas and the University of Texas
at Arlington, a novel device called a "brush optrode" is providing increased
sensitivity with fiber tips designed to thread through hair to enhance scalp
contact. 

This research is expected to open the door to portable, easy-to-use,
high-density optical scanning of brain activity. For example, the University
of Texas researchers' work focuses on the imaging of changes in cortical
plasticity as a function of impairment severity in children with cerebral
palsy. According to Georgios Alexandrakis, a member of the UT Arlington
research team, the newly developed optrodes could also be potentially useful
to a variety of fNIRS projects, including the evaluation of recovery from
stroke, changes in brain activity in Alzheimer's patients, the perception of
pain, and for assessing developmental changes in normal and impaired
pediatric populations. 

Read the entire article at:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-10/osoa-thb101910.php
http://www.osa.org/About_Osa/Newsroom/News_Releases/Releases/10.2010/HairBrush.aspx

Links:
Duncan MacFarlane
http://www.utdallas.edu/~dlm/

Georgios Alexandrakis
http://www.uta.edu/ra/real/editprofile.php?pid=1178