Methods such as the Predicted Mean Vote and Standard New Effective Temperature were developed to evaluate thermal comfort. However, radiation and convection of heat due to factors such as sunlight or air cycle are strong in indoor environments. Moreover, the thermal environment in such indoor environment is non-uniform and locally inhomogeneous, which makes evaluation thermal comfort difficult. We aim to evaluate the local thermal environment by analyzing brain activity. The final goal is to develop an air conditioning control system in non-uniform and locally inhomogeneous thermal environment by brain activity. In this paper, we describe analysis of brain activity during local cold stimulation. We measured oxyhemoglobin (oxyHb) levels in the prefrontal cortex and the primary somatosensory cortex while subjects touched aluminum plates that were cooled or heated to different temperatures. The results show that oxyHb changes in the prefrontal cortex vary according to the temperature of the aluminum plates.
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