Removing Powerline Interference from EEG Signal using Optimized FIR Filters

Mohamed Saber

Electronics and Communications Engineering Dep., Faculty of Engineering, Delta University for Science and Technology, Gamasa City, Mansoura, Egypt

Emails: Mohamed.saber@deltauniv.edu.eg

Abstract

The Electroencephalography (EEG) is a signal representing the electrical activity of the brain and is used in the diagnosis of brain diseases. The EEG signal is weak and highly prone to noise from the powerline which generates a sinusoidal signal with the main frequency of 50/60 Hz. Therefore, three harmonics of powerline noise must be removed using notch filters for a perfect diagnosis which requires three series notch filters. This paper presents a new method to design a digital notch finite impulse response (FIR) filter using a modified particle swarm optimization technique. The proposed method provides a short length, maximum stopband attenuation, and small transition width compared to different algorithms which results in removing the noise in EEG signal efficiently.

Keywords: EEG; power line interference ; Notch FIR filter.