Cognitive Enhancement & Biomedical Applications in Virtual Reality
I. Introduction
Virtual reality (VR) is providing real-time, immersive experience to users in computer generated World. In consumer level, VR is highly related with gaming. However, beside gaming there are numerous of VR applications in different industries. Thanks to those applications, multi-sensor applications are growing, and they are aiming to provide end-user highly interactive and emotional experiences.
We can categorize the multi-sensor applications in four categories [1]:
- VR Treadmills: Allowing end-user walking in the computer-generated World without any accident. Mostly commercial products and highly expensive for consumer market. Two of the important examples are Kat-VR [2] (company has both consumer and enterprise products) and Infinadeck [3] omnidirectional treadmill (product is only available for enterprise market).
- Haptic Gloves: Aiming to simulate feeling (e.g., feeling wet during your arms in a water) of objects via sensors. Those applications are exceeding motion controllers about feel and motion detection accuracy via external skeleton. Haptx [4] is a great example for haptic gloves. Like treadmills, haptic gloves are commercial products too.
- Haptic Vests: Like gloves, haptic vests are aiming to simulate feelings on human body in a virtual environment. There are numerous consumer products in this category. Tesla Suit [5] is great example for both commercial and consumer usage of haptic vests.
- Full Body Tracking: Aiming to detect and monitor all movements in human body. There are couple of ways to achieve that target. Pucks and camera systems are common examples. NHL is a great example for commercial use. NHL is planning to track body movements of players via puck trackers. [6] One of the main developments in this area is Neuralink which is created by Elon Musk. Company is aiming to create brain-computer interaction via surgically installed implement.
Multi-sensor applications are commonly use in enterprise market for training purposes. Projects like Neuralink is creating new possibilities in VR. Neuralink is aiming create science-fiction like capabilities, fixing neurological disorders and enhanced the brain. On trials on pigs, Neuralink detects the body movements of pig with a great accuracy. Company is targeting to reach read-write operations on human brain to fix neurological problems. [7]
II. Cognitive Enhancement and Biomedical Applications
Biomedical applications in virtual reality are emerging and revolutionary in many fields in medicine. Neuralink can be our future but today virtual reality is wide usage in patient training, tracking, diagnostic and cognitive rehabilitation purposes. Germany based company VReha can be a great introductory example of usage of VR in biomedical applications. With the development of neurological diseases such as dementia and Alzheimer, we are losing our cognitive capabilities especially in older ages. Basically, VReha is a VR application for diagnostic of diseases and rehabilitation of patients in virtual environment. Normally, traditional tests are paper pen based, highly abstract and costly for patients. Application is allowing patients to deal with everyday tasks and monitor body movements for diagnostic and rehabilitation purposes. [8]
When we talk about immersive environment (VE), we refer to those in which the sensory information is compelling enough to create perceptions of being physically present within the virtual environment. It can be mix of any form of modality, not just a visual. For example, musical recordings can be though as an aurally rendered VE or smell-touch of something can be seen as augmented VE. [9]
Like in the VReha example, usage of VEs with great tracking and monitoring features, allowing us to diagnose and treat neurological diseases. I tried to collect some of the usage areas in neurology in Table 1 below.
Exposure therapies are common in phobia and anxiety treatment.
Another important development in the field is, researchers found that areas of the brain responsible for identifying and signaling pain have a decrease in activity while the patient is in a immersive VE. Cedars-Sinai Hospital in California, USA is providing virtual therapy for pain management.
For fighting with addiction, Ken Stoner’s TedX talk is a great walkthrough for that topic.
If you like to know more about VReha project, here is the video about the product:
III. Final Thoughts
Virtual reality therapies in various topics and cognitive enhancement applications are proven methods and promising for the future. In first two sections, we saw that main application areas in medicine are diagnostic, therapy and rehabilitation. VR is a relatively new field in medicine, there is no so long history. Today, we can see VR as an accelerator for any neurological treatment. With projects like Neuralink, we can deep dive in VR, thanks to brain-computer interaction and we can actually cure the unsolved diseases like Alzheimer. Like vaccination in COVID-19 pandemics, we should spread the usage of VR on medicine and monitor the result for a better and personalized treatment plans.
Don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter http://eepurl.com/g12Drv
Further Readings & References
[1] Future Tech of Virtual Reality, Youtube, Virtual Insider, April 2020
[2] KAT-VR, Company Website, March 2021
[3] Infinadeck, Company Website, March 2021
[4] Haptx, Company Website, March 2021
[5] Tesla Suit, Company Website, March 2021
[6] NHL Plans to Deploy Puck and Player Tracking Technology Next Season, News, NHL Website, January 2019
[7] Neuralink — Catalyst For Full Dive VR?, Youtube, Pezle, March 2021
[8] VReha: Virtual Realities For Digital Diagnostics and Cognitive Rehabilitation, Youtube, MPI für Kognitions- und Neurowissenschaften, May 2020
[9] Virtual Reality for Psychological and Neurocognitive Interventions, Rizzo A., Bouchard S., Book, p[17–31] ,2019
[10] Virtual Reality As A Tool For Fighting Addiction, Youtube, TedX Talks, March 2017
[11] Can Virtual Reality Help Fight The Oploid Crisis?, Youtube, Freethink, February 2019