Abstract
BackgroundThere is growing interest in the relation between the brain and music. The appealing similarity between brainwaves and the rhythms of music has motivated many scientists to seek a connection between them. A variety of transferring rules has been utilized to convert the brainwaves into music; and most of them are mainly based on spectra feature of EEG.Methodology/Principal FindingsIn this study, audibly recognizable scale-free music was deduced from individual Electroencephalogram (EEG) waveforms. The translation rules include the direct mapping from the period of an EEG waveform to the duration of a note, the logarithmic mapping of the change of average power of EEG to music intensity according to the Fechner's law, and a scale-free based mapping from the amplitude of EEG to music pitch according to the power law. To show the actual effect, we applied the deduced sonification rules to EEG segments recorded during rapid-eye movement sleep (REM) and slow-wave sleep (SWS). The resulting music is vivid and different between the two mental states; the melody during REM sleep sounds fast and lively, whereas that in SWS sleep is slow and tranquil. 60 volunteers evaluated 25 music pieces, 10 from REM, 10 from SWS and 5 from white noise (WN), 74.3% experienced a happy emotion from REM and felt boring and drowsy when listening to SWS, and the average accuracy for all the music pieces identification is 86.8%(κ = 0.800, P<0.001). We also applied the method to the EEG data from eyes closed, eyes open and epileptic EEG, and the results showed these mental states can be identified by listeners.Conclusions/SignificanceThe sonification rules may identify the mental states of the brain, which provide a real-time strategy for monitoring brain activities and are potentially useful to neurofeedback therapy.
Highlights
Understanding the most mysterious brain activities is a longterm goal of science
Music of sleep EEG The resulting music pieces are shown in Figure 3, 4
The results demonstrate that rapid-eye movement sleep (REM) music (Audio S1) encompasses a wide variety of note pitches
Summary
Understanding the most mysterious brain activities is a longterm goal of science. Many technologies, including high-density electroencephalogram (EEG), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and magnetoencephalography (MEG), have been developed in recent years to address this goal. With the exception of EEG, most of these techniques are spatially restricted and cannot be used in real-time. The EEG is a real-time process; if lowfrequency brain waves could be heard after translation by a special sonification rule, we may be able to directly ‘‘perceive’’ brain activity and its variations using our auditory system. As the frequency range of human hearing is large (ranging from 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz) and the average person can hear subtle differences in frequency, the hearing strategy may provide real-time monitoring of brain activities and a more sensitive way to detect the small variations in the amplitude and duration of brain waves that are ignored by conventional EEG technique. A variety of transferring rules has been utilized to convert the brainwaves into music; and most of them are mainly based on spectra feature of EEG
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