A comparative study of electrical potential sensors and Ag/AgCl electrodes for characterising spontaneous and event related electroencephalagram signals.

BACKGROUND: Electroencephalography (EEG) is still a widely used imaging tool that combines high temporal resolution with a relatively low cost. Ag/AgCl metal electrodes have been the gold standard for non-invasively monitoring electrical brain activity. Although reliable, these electrodes have multiple drawbacks: they suffer from noise, such as offset potential drift, and usability issues, for example, difficult skin preparation and cross-coupling of adjacent electrodes. NEW METHOD: In order to tackle these issues a prototype Electric Potential Sensor (EPS) device based on an auto-zero operational amplifier was developed and evaluated. The EPS is a novel active ultrahigh impedance capacitively coupled sensor. The absence of 1/f noise makes the EPS ideal for use with signal frequencies of ∼10Hz or less. A comprehensive study was undertaken to compare neural signals recorded by the EPS with a standard commercial EEG system. RESULTS: Quantitatively, highly similar signals were observed between the EPS and EEG sensors for both free running and evoked brain activity with cross correlations of higher than 0.9 between the EPS and a standard benchmark EEG system. COMPARISON WITH EXISTING METHOD(S): These studies comprised measurements of both free running EEG and Event Related Potentials (ERPs) from a commercial EEG system and EPS. CONCLUSIONS: The EPS provides a promising alternative with many added benefits compared to standard EEG sensors, including reduced setup time and elimination of sensor cross-coupling. In the future the scalability of the EPS will allow the implementation of a whole head ultra-dense EPS array.

Sisyphus effects in a microwave-excited flux-qubit resonator system.

Sisyphus amplification, familiar from quantum optics, has recently been reported as a mechanism to explain the enhanced quality factor of a classical resonant (tank) circuit coupled to a superconducting flux qubit. Here we present data from a coupled system, comprising a quantum mechanical rf SQUID (flux qubit) reactively monitored by an ultrahigh quality factor noise driven rf resonator and excited by microwaves. The system exhibits enhancement of the tank-circuit resonance, bringing it significantly closer (within 1%) to the lasing limit, than previously reported results.

Hardware comb filter enhances dynamic range and noise performance of sensors in noisy environments.

We present the results of combining a hardware implementation of an analog comb filter with an ultralow noise electromagnetic sensor. The comb filter is designed to attenuate mains related interference, at either 50 or 60 Hz, and related harmonics. The sensor chosen for this work is an induction magnetometer, but the method is applicable to any low noise high dynamic range sensor. The resultant system, in this case, uses only a single coil, not a gradiometric configuration, thus providing a magnetometer capable of sensing field as opposed to field gradient. This combination of filter and sensor allows additional gain to be added and the full sensitivity of the system to be achieved, previously only realized in an electromagnetically screened room. At the same time, the high dynamic range, low noise performance, and original bandwidth of the sensor are maintained. The technique is illustrated by using the system in an urban environment to observe Schumann resonance phenomena. This approach to acquiring small signals in a noisy environment is compared with conventional analog filter and digital signal processing techniques.

Pinch resonances in a radio-frequency-driven superconducting-quantum-interference-device ring-resonator system.

In this paper we present experimental data on the frequency domain response of a superconducting-quantum-interference-device ring (a Josephson weak link enclosed by a thick superconducting ring) coupled to a radio frequency tank circuit resonator. We show that with the ring weakly hysteretic the resonance line shape of this coupled system can display opposed fold bifurcations that appear to touch (pinch off). We demonstrate that for appropriate circuit parameters these pinch off line shapes exist as solutions of the nonlinear equations of motion for the system.

High-performance UHF SQUID magnetometer.

We describe a lumped-component stabilized point contact SQUID magnetometer, biased at 430 MHz and utilizing a cooled (4.2 K) GaAs FET preamplifier. The system incorporateds a full-bandwidth (5-10 MHz) flux-locked loop and has an overall flux sensitivity of 1x10(-5) Phi0/(Hz)(1/2), corresponding to an energy sensitivity approximately 4.5x10(-31) J/Hz.