Controlling machines with brainwaves seems like science fiction, but if a University of Tennessee at Chattanooga research project succeeds, it could be the wave of the future.
Daniel Pack, dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science at UTC, received about $300,000 grant from the U.S. Army to study technology that could allow soldiers to command drones, also called unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, with their thoughts instead of burdensome equipment.
“The goal of the project is to allow humans – it doesn’t have to be just in the military setting – to interact with machines in a variety of ways using our brainwaves,” Pack said. “I think there’s a lot of interest that’s coming on for the project.”
Using his mind as the control station, electrical engineering major Tony Ferguson, who began working on the project in January, managed to launch and land a drone for the first time in September.
Ferguson wears a headset of 16 sensors, which measure electrical impulses from his brain. The signals are then sent to a computer that converts the measurements into commands the drone recognizes.