NeuroRighter

Hello!

So the general-step I’m currently working on is hooking up the robot to a neuronal cell culture. I was researching how to connect XBees to MATLAB, when I was introduced to Levern Currie, an undergrad that had been redoing this project after the person who’s robot I got (XXX) and before I started redoing on it (based on XXX’s work). (Does this make sense)? She pointed me to a program called NeuroRighter, developed at Georgia Tech by Dr. Steve Potter (who has asked not to be disturbed by the community).

What is NeuroRighter?

Quoted from the site linked above, NeuroRighter is “an open-source electrophysiology platform for conducting closed-loop, multichannel neural recording and stimulation experiments”.

In simpler terms, it can be used to create a feedback loop that sends signals from my robot –> communication setup –> neurons. Then it can wait for the neurons’ response (if any), and send a signal back –> communication setup –> robot, which will react accordingly.  It’s apparently a little more involved than this description, but that’s the gist of it.

This article (free access sponsored by MultiChannel Systems) also does a pretty good job of explaining it (and they’ve got a video!).

How to Download NeuroRighter

(This gets its own section because it took me a while… )

First, check out this Google Site on NeuroRighter, which gives pretty detailed instructions on how to use it. It has a couple of “dependencies”, but the site and (I think) program were last updated in 2015, so downloading and setting up NeuroRighter involves getting older versions of things. Details below:

The prerequisite programs needed for NeuroRighter to function are listed here.

  1. it says to download Microsoft XNA Framework v4.0, but getting this to install actually requires downloading another program: either Visual Studio 2010 or Visual Studio C# 2010 Express.
  2. Either way, you’re downloading a much older version of a program, so a Microsoft account is required. Head here, and after logging in + clicking appropriate link, you’ll eventually be directed to a site that looks like this:
  3. Download an EXE from the option that says “Visual Studio 2010 Express”, and then from the Download drop-down option, choose the “VSC” option.
  4. Install Visual Studio, and then install the XNA Framework.
  5. The Google Site says you also need to download NI drivers. I haven’t (yet), because NeuroRighter installed correctly and opened up without me needing to (on the Site, it said that NeuroRighter would not be able to open up without its dependencies… so maybe I don’t need to download the NI drivers?) Regardless, the link on the NeuroRighter Google Site doesn’t work, so try this or this.

Okay, I think that’s it for now! I’m going to play around with NeuroRighter a bit, and try to figure out how exactly I’ll be hooking it up the robot: stay tuned for more!

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