A P300-Based Brain–Computer Interface for Chinese Character Input

ABSTRACT

The majority of previously developed assistive communication brain–computer interface systems have primarily focused on languages that are written in alphabetic scripts. However, languages that are written in logographic scripts, such as those in Chinese hanzi (or sinograms), pose a challenge for the implementation of visual spelling systems because it is impossible to simultaneously display thousands of items in a stimulus matrix of a reasonable size. In this study, a P300 visual spelling system that uses a novel method to input Chinese sinograms developed with a Hanyu Pinyin-based method is presented. This method transcribes a Chinese Pinyin into initial consonant and vowel components according to its Mandarin pronunciation. In this paradigm, each sinogram is input by selecting the initial consonant and then the vowel components and subsequently selecting the sinogram itself. Ten healthy subjects participated in the study and achieved an average offline accuracy of 92.6% with a mean information transfer rate of 39.2 bits/min and an average online input speed of one sinogram per 43.9 s. The preliminary results presented here indicated that the online input of Chinese text using a Pinyin-based visual speller is feasible.

Funding

This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program (Grant No 2015CB351706) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 91320202 and 91420302).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program (Grant No 2015CB351706) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 91320202 and 91420302).

Notes on contributors

Yang Yu

Yang Yu was born in Liaoning, China, in 1987. He received his BSc degree from Tianjin University in 2010, and his MSc degree from the National University of Defense Technology, China, in 2012, where he is currently working toward his PhD degree. His research interests include brain–computer interface and neuroimages.

Zongtan Zhou

Zongtan Zhou was born in Henan, China, in 1969. He received BSc, MSc, and PhD degrees from the National University of Defense Technology, China, in 1990, 1994, and 1998, respectively. He was promoted to Professor in 2007. His research interests include brain–computer interface, cognitive neuroscience, image/signal processing, computer/biologicalvision, and neural networks.

Erwei Yin

Erwei Yin was born in Heilongjiang, China, in 1985. He received his BSc degree from Jilin University in 2008, and he received MSc and PhD degrees from the National University of Defense Technology, China, in 2010 and 2015, respectively. His research interests include brain–computer interfaces and machine learning.

Jun Jiang

Jun Jiang was born in Zhejiang, China, in 1987. He received BSc and MSc degrees from the National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, China, in 2009 and 2011, respectively, where he is currently working toward his PhD degree. His research interests include brain–computer interfaces and machine learning.

Yadong Liu

Yadong Liu was born in Gansu, China, in 1977. He received BSc and PhD degrees from the National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, China, in 2000 and 2006, respectively. His research interests include image/signal processing, computer/biological vision, system identification and control, and cognitive science.

Dewen Hu

Dewen Hu was born in Hunan, in 1963. He received the BSc and MSc degrees from Xi’an Jiaotong University, in 1983 and 1986, respectively. He got his PhD degree from the National University of Defense Technology in 1999. His research interests include cognitive science, brain–computer interface, and neural networks.