Virtual hand prosthesis moved by encephalographic signals

This paper presents a research project that has the challenge of manipulating a prosthetic hand in a virtual simulation environment using a natural interface based on a BCI (Brain Computer Interface), which should propose a new paradigm for the manipulation of a prosthetic hand. The information provided by encephalographic (EEG) signals captured from an Emotiv® headset is used for the manipulation of a virtual hand prosthesis. This system has fourteen electrodes distributed over the skull of the user, who after a training phase can produce simple commands through the manufacturer´s software. Finally, this research presents the results obtained so far, where the user´s encephalographic signals move a virtual hand built in the computer (using free software tools as Qt and VTK). It is expected that the user can train and reproduce various grasps such as cylindrical, spherical and pincer grasp in the virtual hand.