Ever wonder what goes on inside a musician’s head? As a bit of an amateur musician myself, I’d sure like to see the complex neural interactions that work to fuel a musician’s creativity. I imagine that in itself would be one heck of a show.
Thanks to GE’s Neuro VR experience, now you can get a pretty psychedelic view of a musician’s brain activity during a performance. Through the lens of the Oculus Rift, data from MRI scans are converted into surges of color that represent the complicated visual, auditory, and motor functions at work while a musician plays.
Definitely take a look at the technology at work, it’s quite the show!
Neuro VR presents an interactive and clever way to visualize neuroimaging information in 3D. In his interview with Engadget, GE Global Research’s Sandeep Gupta speculates that “a neurosurgeon could use tools like these to get a complete view of lesions and possible impact of surgery on brain networks and function. The most immediate benefit of the Neuro VR system is perhaps in training for neuroscientists.”
Kite and Lightning is the VR content studio behind the hypnotic imaging technology. Rather than the traditional 2D MRI scan that a physician would peruse to take a peek into the brain, Neuro VR could allow someone to quite literally step into and walk around the “brainscape.” As our knowledge about the brain is still somewhat limited, using VR technology to explore it could have a profound impact on our understanding of how it works.
Take for example a neurological disorder: rather than a series of images detailing neurological activity to be examined, Neuro VR could provide a burst of color potentially easier to decode, which examination of a 2D scan might not bring to light.
This is all of course dependent on whether physicians can withstand having their own minds blown by the psychedelic experience of walking around in the brain.
