The innovation is part of research into brain-computer interfaces (接口) to help improve the lives of people with motor disabilities. The researchers included machine learning capabilities with their brain-computer interface, making it a one-size-fits-all solution.
Typically, these devices require extensive adjustment for each user- every brain is different, both for healthy and disabled users- and that has been a major hurdle to mainstream adoption. This new solution can quickly understand the needs of an individual subject and self-adjust through repetition. That means multiple patients could use the device without needing to tune it to the individual.
In a clinical setting, the subjects wear a cap packed with electrodes (电极) that is connected to a computer. The electrodes gather data by measuring electrical signals from the brain, and the decoder translates the brain signals into commands, which are used to control devices or applications. In this case, the decoded signals are translated into actions in a car racing game and a simpler task involving balancing a digital bar. Subjects were trained simultaneously for both the simpler bar game and the more complex car racing game, thus improving their brain function.
The researchers call this work foundational, in that it sets the stage for further brain-computer interface innovation. This project used 18 subjects with no motor disabilities. As they continue down this road, they will test this on people with motor disabilities to apply it to larger groups in clinical settings. “To achieve this, we need to improve our technology to make it easier to use,’ Millan. a professor in the University of Texas says.
On the side of translating the research, Millan and his team continue to work on a wheelchair that users can drive with the brain- computer interface. At the South by Southwest Conference and Festivals this month, the researchers showed off another potential use of the technology. controlling two rehabilitation (康复) robots for the hand and arm. This was not part of the new paper but a sign of where this technology could go in the future. “We’ll continue down this path wherever it takes us in the pursuit of helping people.” Millan says.
1. Who will benefit the most from the Brain-Computer Interface innovation?| A．People with physical disabilities. | B．Businessmen selling wheelchairs. |
| C．Students seeking academic improvement. | D．Athletes seeking performance enhancement. |
| A．Faster adjustment process. | B．Decreased need for tuning. |
| C．Improved mainstream adoption. | D．Quick understanding of commands. |
| A．Translating signals. | B．Measuring brain signals. |
| C．Controlling devices. | D．Enhancing brain function. |
| A．Exploring hand and arm rehabilitation. |
| B．Showcasing technology at conferences. |
| C．Translating and publishing research papers. |
| D．Enhancing brain- computer interface technology. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Imagine you enter a car with no steering wheel, no brake or accelerator pedals ( 踏 板 ). Under a voice-activated command, you say an address. “The fastest route will take us 15.3 minutes. Should I take it?” You say “yes” and you are on your way. The car responds and starts moving all by itself. All you have to do is to sit back and relax.
How strange would it be if, one day in the future, everyone had such a car? No crazy driving, no quarrels, no cutting in; traffic laws would be respected and driving much safer. On the other hand, imagine the cost savings for local police enforcement (强制执行) and town budgets without all those speeding and parking tickets.
A new technology has the potential to change modern society thoroughly. There’s no question that self-driving vehicles could be an enormous benefit. The potential for safer cars means accident statistics would drop: some 94% of road accidents in the U.S. involve human error. Older drivers and visually- or physically-disabled people would gain a new level of freedom. Maintaining safe speeds and being electric, self-driving cars would sharply reduce pollution levels and dependency on non-renewable fuels. Roads would be quieter, people safer.
But we must also consider the impact of the new technology on those who now depend on driving for their living. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, in May 2015 there were 505,560 registered school bus drivers. The American Trucking Association lists approximately 3.5 million professional truck drivers in the U.S. The companies developing self-driving vehicles should be partnering with state and federal authorities to offer retraining for this massive workforce, many of whom will be displaced by the new technology.
New technologies will, and should, be developed. This is how society moves forward. However, progress can’t be one-sided. It is necessary for the companies and state agencies involved to consider the moral consequences of these potential changes to build a better future for all.
1. What would be the effect of the wide use of driverless cars?| A．More policemen would inspect the streets. |
| B．People would never feel angry about the traffic. |
| C．It would save local governments a lot of money. |
| D．Traffic regulations would be a thing of the past. |
| A．They would get rid of air pollution. | B．They could enjoy greater mobility. |
| C．They would suffer no road accidents. | D．They could go anywhere they want. |
| A．The conflict between labor and management would sharpen. |
| B．Many drivers would have to find new ways of earning a living. |
| C．Drivers would have a hard time adapting to new road conditions. |
| D．The gap between various departments of society would be widened. |
| A．Enable everyone to benefit from new technologies. |
| B．Keep pace with technological developments. |
| C．Make new technologies affordable to everyone. |
| D．Popularize the use of new technologies and devices. |
【推荐2】Robots have certain advantages compared to humans. They are efficient, tireless, can be repaired when damaged and they never get sick. The last quality has made them the star during our fight against the COVID-19(新冠肺炎). While thousands of medical workers have fallen ill dealing with this highly infectious virus and a lot more have to stay at home for fear of getting the disease, this isn’t a problem for robots. This is why the COVID-19 outbreak is seen as the “tipping point” for robots to start to replace humans in certain jobs.
In hospitals, robots are used to perform high-risk tasks. In China, for example, a hotel in Hangzhou employed a robot to deliver food to people under quarantine(隔离). In Spain, robots are about to be used to test people for the coronavirus(冠状病毒).
In non-medical companies, robots are also replacing human employees since they don’t have the problem of the social distancing and will never take sick leave. Fast-food chains like McDonald’s are not only delivering food with robots in some areas, but also looking to use them as cooks and servers. Walmart and Amazon, for example, where robots are already used in packing and shipping, are planning to increase the number of robots in these areas.
But this sudden boom in robot demand doesn’t mean that they can replace humans successfully in every aspect. According to Bill Smart, a roboticist at Oregon State University, the human contact between doctors and patients is still important. Doctors comfort the patients and guide them through hard decisions while robots are only doing daily tasks, like cleaning and giving tests.
It might be true that robots have certain advantages over humans, but they are still secondary to human’s communication and emotion.
1. Which of the following is not the advantage of robots over human beings?| A．They never fall ill. |
| B．They can offer emotion support. |
| C．They are efficient in work. |
| D．They can be repaired when damaged. |
| A．To explain robots are more intelligent than humans. |
| B．To prove robots have social ability wherever they are. |
| C．To explain how robots replace humans in non-medical companies. |
| D．To prove McDonald’s and Walmart are famous companies in the world. |
| A．Sharp increase. | B．Low supply. |
| C．Short explosion. | D．Excellent performance. |
| A．The Efficient Tireless Robots | B．Robots Will Replace Humans |
| C．Robots Aid in Coronavirus Fight | D．The demand For Robots Increase |
【推荐3】5G has the potential to disrupt a huge number of industries, including one of the world’s oldest: Farming. Next-generation 5G networks can be 100 times faster than 4G, making communication between devices and servers much quicker. 5G can also carry much more data than other networks. That makes the technology ideal for transmitting information from remote sensors and drones, key tools that are being tested by farmers. 5G is also helping to automate farming processes.
UK initiative 5G RuralFirst launched a smartphone app in March called Me+Moo, which lets farmers track a “connected” cow and receive daily updates on the animal’s health and behavior. The system, which is being tested on cows at the Agri-Epi Center in Somerset, England, is funded in part by UK government and supported by the tech company Cisco (CSCO). The cows wear 5G-connected collars that send data to the app on everything from what they’re eating to how they’re sleeping. Farmers can see the information instantly. “This provides peace of mind that the cows are happy, healthy and behaving normally, as well as early warning if they are getting sick, are pregnant or need to be checked,” said project manager Duncan Forbes.
Yet to make a difference, 5G will first need to be installed in rural areas. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) predicts that in order to provide for the world’s rapidly rising population, the planet will need to grow 70% more food in 2050 than it did in 2009. “To respond to those demands, farmers will need new technologies to produce more from less land, with fewer hands,” reads one report from the organization.
In 2017, another 5G RuralFirst project became the first in the world to successfully plant, tend and harvest a crop without a single human stepping foot in the field. Autonomous Automatic tractors sowed the seeds, drones with sensors monitored the crops, and smaller machines took samples from fields to assess what fertilizers and pesticides to apply.
1. Why can 5G help the farming?| A．Because it can carry more information. |
| B．Because it can be equipped with sensors. |
| C．Because it can disrupt a lot of industries. |
| D．Because it can be installed in rural areas. |
| A．They founded a tech company. |
| B．They let the cows wear 5G-connected collars. |
| C．They kept cows behaving normally. |
| D．They made sure the cows were checked often. |
| A．People should control the rising population. |
| B．People should find more and more land. |
| C．People should turn to the new technology. |
| D．People should learn to get more money. |
| A．It analyzed the soil. |
| B．It dug earth with tractors. |
| C．It employed experts. |
| D．It hired drones with sensors. |
【推荐1】Where the streets smell like cheese: Milwaukee tries dairy waste as de-icer
In response to the winter storm striking the area last weekend, street crews of Milwaukee, a city in Wisconsin, will be spreading cheese brine(卤水)along its ice-covered streets this winter as an alternative of normally used rock salt, which serves as an essential road de-icer despite its damaging impact on the environment.
The trial was inspired by a successful experiment in rural Polk County. In addition to being a more effective de-icer due to a lower freezing point, the cheesy liquid prevents rock salt from bouncing and scattering off roadways, which means less has to be used and less of it ends up entering the surrounding environment.
Milwaukee can make good use of the difficult-to-dispose type of organic waste found in great abundance across the state: salty leftover cheese-making juice. Sometimes you just have to get creative and work with the type of waste byproduct and turn it into something beneficial. When the first cheese brine salt trucks of the city appeared in the street last week, Tom Barrett, Mayor of Milwaukee, compared the act to “thinking outside of the cheese box”.
To be clear, Milwaukee won’t completely replace rock salt with thousands of gallons of salty cheese juice. The project, which will first be tested in Bay View neighborhood, will involve a mixture of rock salt and cheese brine. The brine will be sourced from a production plant owned by F&A Dairy in Polk County. Milwaukee will save in rock salt costs while F&A Dairy, which transforms 900, 000 pounds of milk into cheese every day, will save cash in the brine disposal.
While it is noted that the cheese brine solution has a “distinctive odor.” Emil Norby, the gentleman who originally thought of using cheese brine to treat ice-covered roads, explains that Milwaukee residents can expect to experience the slight bad milk smell once the cheese brine is applied to streets. He smiles, “I don’t really mind it. Our roads smell like Wisconsin!”
1. Why does the cheese brine become an option as a road de-icer?| A．It increases the consumption of cheese. | B．It decreases milk byproducts. |
| C．It is from experiences of Polk County. | D．It’s more effective and eco-friendly. |
| A．A test with an expected result. | B．A trial made creatively. |
| C．A company benefiting the locals. | D．A volunteer who protects environments. |
| A．It will make a fortune for the city. | B．It will change the life of local people. |
| C．It will attract more investment. | D．It will be a win-win co-operation. |
| A．It will lead to bad appetite. | B．It may make them sick. |
| C．It is still acceptable. | D．It cannot be noticed. |
【推荐2】All over the world people enjoy sports. Sports help to keep people healthy, happy and help them to live longer.
Sports change with the season. People play different games in winter and summer. Games and sports often grow out of people's work and everyday activities. The Arabs use horses or camels in much of their everyday life; they use them in their sports, too.
Some sports are so interesting that people everywhere go in for them. Football, for example, has spread around the world. Swimming is popular in all countries near the sea or in those with many rivers.
Some sports or games go back thousands of years, like running or jumping. Chinese boxing, for example, has a very long history. But basketball and volleyball are rather new. Neither one is a hundred years old yet. People are inventing new sports or games all the time.
People from different countries may not be able to understand each other, but after a game they often become good friends. Sports help to train a person's character (性格). One learns to fight hard but fight fair, to win without pride and to lose with grace (优雅).
1. According to this passage, which of the following isn't true?| A．Sports help to train a person's character. |
| B．People swim only because there are a lot of rivers in their country. |
| C．People from different countries may not be able to understand each other before a game. |
| D．Sports and games can develop the friendship between peoples all over the world. |
| A．basketball was invented in America |
| B．sports change with the seasons |
| C．games and sports often grow out of people's work and everyday activities |
| D．football is played all over the world |
| A．sports and games are unimportant things that people do |
| B．sports and games should be treated (对待) only as amusement (娱乐活动) |
| C．sports and games are only useful to the old |
| D．none of the above is true |
【推荐3】Clark’s Nutcrackers generally live in high mountain whitebark pine (白皮松) forests. They seem to prefer forests that open or, at least, with frequent openings. The bird has a gray body with black wings and tail. If you were to draw a cartoon combining a crow with a woodpecker( KNA), you would have the Clark’s Nutcracker. It is a member of the family Corvidae, which includes crows. It was first discovered during the Lewis and Clark Expedition — the first American expedition to cross what is now the western part of the US. Clark described it as “some form of woodpecker”.
The nutcracker consumes the seeds of the whitebark pine. In late summer and fall, the tracker will begin to store its seeds. The bird buries the seeds in the soil. A single Clark’s Nutcracker may store upwards of 30, 000 seeds each year, and there may be as many as 1, 000 separate storage sites. In the winter, they will get the seeds back for food.
This creature, however, does not just rely on its food stores. Much of its diet consists of pine seeds and the remainder is composed of nuts, berries, insects, eggs, and in the winter dead animals flesh. They search for food in the trees and on the ground. They catch insects out of midair in flight. Occasionally, the bird becomes a woodpecker using its specialized mouth to pound dead wood for insects.
The nutcracker possesses the behavior suitable to spread the seeds constantly.
The bird stores them deep enough in the soil to greatly reduce the problem of rodents (啮齿动物) finding the seeds. It will certainly fail to get back a certain percentage of its food. The unused seeds will then start to grow and become new trees so not only does the Clark’s Nutcracker take advantage of the whitebark pine, the tree uses the bird too.
1. What do we know about the Clark’s Nutcracker?| A．It looks like a kind of crow |
| B．It has bright and colorful body |
| C．It likes living in the riverside. |
| D．It belongs to a species of Corvidae. |
| A．caring and fierce |
| B．sensitive and beautiful |
| C．hardworking and intelligent |
| D．clever and selfless |
| A．The nutcracker can help to spread seeds. |
| B．The nutcracker faces the danger of dying out. |
| C．Rodents are the whitebark pine’s main enemies. |
| D．The birds can hide their food inside the whitebark pine. |
