Different academic institutions have followed different paths in BCI research.

In a 2013 ebook, the slow but steady progression of brain-computer interface advances have been described in detail:

Progressively more sophisticated BCI systems have been demonstrated over the last decade, moving from 2 and 3-dimensional control of a cursor on a computer screen [2002] to indirect [2003] and finally direct control of a 4 degree-of-freedom (DoF) robot arm [2008].

Source: “Brain-Computer Interface Research: A State-of-the-Art Summary,” by Christoph Guger, et al., ebook published by Springer Science & Business Media, Mar 26, 2013.

In 2004, there were two branches of brain-computer interface that were markedly different in approach, although to onlookers the resulting mind to machine output seemed similar. For example, in the following video, the news media jumbled two kinds of research at 3 institutions into one BCI result.

2009: Research of different types, by different teams, can have similar outcomes

VIDEO: 2 min. 36 sec. While the 2009 video below mixes research from different institutions, the video nevertheless is one of the best views of a monkey operating a robotic arm with its mind. This monkey is a University of Pittsburgh research subject.

The video references a monkey feeding itself bits of marshmallow; it is believed that the marshmallow video was created at Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, not using EEG technology, but rather using Epidural ElectroCorticography (EECoG).

The cursor movement by Matt Nagle occurred at Brown University in 2004 under the auspices of BrainGate.

Not shown is a concurrent 2004 experiment with epileptic patients conducted by Daniel Moran’s lab at Washington University.

To see a human manipulating a robotic arm at the University of Pittsburgh, in 2012 (4 years after this monkey moved the arm), visit the next page.