Design of a treatment and support system with facial recognition ability for prosopagnosia patients

Although prosopagnosia (face blindness) is a very rare disease in the world, it has dramatic consequences because patients cannot recognize faces. Patients cannot distinguish faces due to congenital or traumatic lesions. This study takes advantage of the plasticity property of the brain. Plasticity refers to the restructuring of the brain's neuronal connections through new stimuli. The brain can reconstruct the neuronal connections it has through new stimuli. This new type of stimulus causes plasticity in the brain, and signals reach non-functioning brain areas through newly formed connections. In this study, a system with facial recognition feature was designed for treatment and support for prosopagnosia patients to recognize faces, and two different methods were proposed to use this system for treatment. The signals produced by the designed system were sent to the patient through a stimulator circuit implemented on the printed circuit instead of high-cost stimulators and electrodes that fulfill the anode-cathode function over their skin.