Towards Unified Neural Decoding of Perceived, Spoken and Imagined Speech from EEG Signals

Brain signals accompany various information relevant to human actions and mental imagery, making them crucial to interpreting and understanding human intentions. Brain-computer interface technology leverages this brain activity to generate external commands for controlling the environment, offering critical advantages to individuals with paralysis or locked-in syndrome. Within the brain-computer interface domain, brain-to-speech research has gained attention, focusing on the direct synthesis of audible speech from brain signals. Most current studies decode speech from brain activity using invasive techniques and emphasize spoken speech data. However, humans express various speech states, and distinguishing these states through non-invasive approaches remains a significant yet challenging task. This research investigated the effectiveness of deep learning models for non-invasive-based neural signal decoding, with an emphasis on distinguishing between different speech paradigms, including perceived, overt, whispered, and imagined speech, across multiple frequency bands. The model utilizing the spatial conventional neural network module demonstrated superior performance compared to other models, especially in the gamma band. Additionally, imagined speech in the theta frequency band, where deep learning also showed strong effects, exhibited statistically significant differences compared to the other speech paradigms.

Enhanced Generative Adversarial Networks for Unseen Word Generation from EEG Signals

Recent advances in brain-computer interface (BCI) technology, particularly based on generative adversarial networks (GAN), have shown great promise for improving decoding performance for BCI. Within the realm of Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI), GANs find application in addressing many areas. They serve as a valuable tool for data augmentation, which can solve the challenge of limited data availability, and synthesis, effectively expanding the dataset and creating novel data formats, thus enhancing the robustness and adaptability of BCI systems. Research in speech-related paradigms has significantly expanded, with a critical impact on the advancement of assistive technologies and communication support for individuals with speech impairments. In this study, GANs were investigated, particularly for the BCI field, and applied to generate text from EEG signals. The GANs could generalize all subjects and decode unseen words, indicating its ability to capture underlying speech patterns consistent across different individuals. The method has practical applications in neural signal-based speech recognition systems and communication aids for individuals with speech difficulties.