Unveiling Visual Physiology and Steady-State Evoked Potentials using Low-Cost and Transferable Electroencephalography for Evaluating Neuronal Activation

Abstract

Purpose: The ability to see and process images depends on the function of the eyes and the processing of visual information by neurons in the cerebral cortex, something that could be measured through electroencephalography (EEG). Although the EEG is used to evaluate visual pathways in children and demyelination diseases, the limited utilization of brain recording techniques in other applications like therapy is primarily due to budget constraints. The goal of this paper is to demonstrate results from studying brain aspects of vision, utilizing measurements based on oscillatory activity analysis, low-cost, portable equipment, and a processing pipeline relying on Python’s open-source libraries. These studies involve healthy subjects who wear glasses to assess changes in visual perception. Methods: First, electroencephalographic signals were recorded while the subjects observed a visually standardized stimulus. The signals were processed and filtered to reduce artifacts, and the power spectral density (PSD) was calculated to observe the presence of steady-state visual potentials (VEP) to confirm the capture of neuronal activation to the visual stimulus. Results: It was possible to establish a difference between subjects wearing and not wearing their glasses, allowing validation that the information acquired with the transferable equipment is adequate for the analysis of neuronal activity related to visual processing, opening the possibility to be used in future studies in therapy. Conclusion: This study contributes to the development of cost-effective and portable EEG solutions for visual system analysis. It demonstrates the potential for applying transferable EEG devices in clinical settings and highlights the importance of tailored visual stimuli for reliable neural activation.