COMPUTER-CONTROLLED ELECTROPHYSIOLOGICAL INSTRUMENTS

A LABORATORY AUTOMATION SYSTEM (LAS) FOR ELECTROPHYSIOLOGISTS WILL BE DEVELOPED. IT WILL CONSIST OF A COMPUTER-CONTROLLED NETWORK OF NINE SMART INSTRUMENTS, WHICH WOULD REPLACE THEIR CONVENTIONAL COUNTERPARTS, INCLUDING A STIMULATOR/CONTROLLER, ANALOG AND DIGITAL SWITCHING DEVICES, WAVEFORM GENERATOR, PHYSIOLOGICAL MONITOR, INTERVAL ANALYSIS SYSTEM, WAVEFORM PROCESSOR (AVERAGER), ELECTROMETER, AND WAVEFORM RECOGNITION DEVICE. APPROPRIATE ANCILLARY DEVICES WILL ALSO BE DEVELOPED. THE LAS WILL PROVIDE AUTOMATION OF DIFFICULT AND TIME-CONSTRAINED EXPERIMENTS, WITH THE EVENTUAL ADDITION OF EXPERT SYSTEM SUPERVISION. IN PHASE I, DEVELOPMENT OF THE DEVICES ALREADY BEGUN WILL CONTINUE, AND DEVELOPMENT OF MORE SOPHISTICATED DEVICES WILLBEGIN. IN PHASE II, THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PROPOSED DEVICESWILL BE CONCLUDED. THESE DEVICES CAN BE USED IN ELECTROPHYSIOLOGICAL RESEARCH, I.E., IN STUDIES OF NEUROPHYSIOLOGICAL MECHANISMS OF NORMAL AND PATHOLOGICAL PROCESSES. SOME DEVICES, SUCH AS THE PHYSIOLOGICAL MONITOR, CAN BE USED FOR MONITORING SUBJECTS' PHYSIOLOGICAL STATES, E.G., DURING SLEEP STUDIES.