Abstract
In 2014, media artist Daniela de Paulis first presented at ASTRON in The
Netherlands the possibility of radio-transmission of brain activity as
part of her project ‘’COGITO in Space”, for which laboratory-grade EEG
recordings are analyzed and converted to sound in real-time, using an
open-source interstellar EEG-transmission protocol designed for the
project by Guillaume Dumas and Michael Sanders and integrated in the
EEGsynth fieldtrip software package. The 25m dish antenna of the
Dwingeloo radio telescope in The Netherlands instantly transmits this
audio-stream into space while the participant’s brain activity is
recorded. The antenna uses amateur radio equipment, with a
SingleSideBand (SSB) 120W power transmission with a fixed dish position.
By spreading transmissions over the sky chances of possible detection by
an alien civilization are limited. One of the challenges of the project
was the real-time conversion of 32-channel EEG into a mono 3kHz audio
signal for a linear SSB modulated radio transmission, including the 3D
electrode positions that would allow the reconstruction of the cortical
activity and topography by a hypothetical receiver.