Spatial mislocalization of EEG electrodes - effects on accuracy of dipole estimation

Objective: The estimation of cortical current activity from scalp-recorded potentials is a complicated mathematical problem that requires fairly precise knowledge of the location of the scalp electrodes. It is expected that spatial mislocalization of electrodes will introduce errors in this estimation. The present study uses simulated and real data to quantify these errors for dipole current sources in a spherical head model. Methods: A 3-dimensional digitizer was used to locate the positions of 31 scalp electrodes placed on the head according to the 10-20 system in 10 normal subjects. Dipole localizations were performed on auditory evoked potentials (AEPs) collected from these subjects. Results: Computer simulations with several dipole source configurations suggest that errors in locations and orientations on the order of 5 mm and 5 degrees, respectively, are possible for electrode mislocalizations of about 5 degrees. In actual experimental settings, digitized electrode positions were typically mislocalized by an average of about 4 degrees from their standard 10-20 positions on a spherical model. These differences in electrode positions translated to mean differences of about 8 mm in dipole locations and 5 degrees in dipole orientations. Conclusions: Dipole estimation errors due to electrode mislocalizations are within the limits of errors due to other modeling approximations and noise. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.