A high-frequency SSVEP-BCI system based on a 360 Hz refresh rate

Abstract

Abstract Objective. Steady-state visual evoked potential (SSVEP) based brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) often struggle to balance user experience and system performance. To address this challenge, this study employed stimuli in the 55–62.8 Hz frequency range to implement a 40-target BCI speller that offered both high-performance and user-friendliness. Approach. This study proposed a method that presents stable multi-target stimuli on a monitor with a 360 Hz refresh rate. Real-time generation of stimulus matrix and stimulus rendering was used to ensure stable presentation while reducing the computational load. The 40 targets were encoded using the joint frequency and phase modulation method, offline and online BCI experiments were conducted on 16 subjects using the task discriminant component analysis algorithm for feature extraction and classification. Main results. The online BCI system achieved an average accuracy of 88.87% ± 3.05% and an information transfer rate of 51.83 ± 2.77 bits min−1 under the low flickering perception condition. Significance. These findings suggest the feasibility and significant practical value of the proposed high-frequency SSVEP BCI system in advancing the visual BCI technology.