Time for a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e-newsletter. This time we focus on how much the brain health and behav­ioral health fields are chang­ing, as they upgrade tra­di­tional toolk­its with dig­i­tal plat­forms to bet­ter mon­i­tor, assess and enhance cog­ni­tion. Often dri­ven by a grow­ing con­sumer demand for improved brain fit­ness, as you can see in this 3-minute clip (opens YouTube video).

We are proud to report that our lat­est mar­ket report is prov­ing to be valu­able to a range of exec­u­tives and inno­va­tors work­ing along those lines, as you can read here.

New Sci­ence

• Neu­ro­sci­en­tists: Develop dig­i­tal games to improve brain func­tion and well-being
• Mis­use & Abuse of ADHD Meds among col­lege stu­dents: Updated review of a grow­ing concern
• Beyond hel­mets: con­cus­sions require proac­tive, indi­vid­u­al­ized mon­i­tor­ing and rehab

New Tools

• Work­ing mem­ory train­ing can improve emo­tional reg­u­la­tion and behav­ioral health
• Cam­bridge Cog­ni­tion, devel­oper of com­put­erised neu­ropsy­cho­log­i­cal tests, to go pub­lic in the UK
• The future of biosen­sors and nanotechnology

New think­ing

• Debunk­ing 10 Brain Fit­ness and Brain Train­ing Myths
• Rais­ing aware­ness about the dis­tracted mind (PBS special)
• Drugs for Early-Stage Alzheimer’s?
• New guide­lines for neu­rol­o­gists pre­scrib­ing cog­ni­tive enhance­ment drugs

Have a great month of April!

Time for Sharp­Brains’ Feb­ru­ary 2013 eNewslet­ter, fea­tur­ing this time new sci­ence and analy­sis on Alzheimer’s Dis­ease, ADHD, men­tal well-being, brain health, and more. Enjoy!

New sci­ence:

• Alzheimer’s Dis­ease pop­u­la­tion to triple: We need smarter research, pub­lic health ini­tia­tives and lifestyles, by Pas­cale Mich­e­lon, PhD
• National Sci­ence Foun­da­tion report: Can inter­ac­tive media boost atten­tion and well-being?
• Study: Mind­ful­ness train­ing for chil­dren with ADHD and their par­ents, by David Rabiner, PhD
• New $1 mil­lion grant to study work­ing mem­ory train­ing in chil­dren with frag­ile X

New analy­sis:

• Using Your Head: What is the Future of Brain Health?, where David Coleiro inter­views Alvaro Fernandez
• Biofeed­back is a “Level 1 — Best Sup­port” Inter­ven­tion for Atten­tion and Hyper­ac­tiv­ity Behaviors
• Is the Inter­net Good or Bad for Your Brain?, by Alvaro Fernandez

Upcom­ing events:

• ESCoNS2 (LA), Har­vard, WEF (Lima), Neu­rogam­ing (San Fran­cisco), mesh13 (Toronto):  Alvaro Fer­nan­dez will be speak­ing at sev­eral events in the next few months. If you’re a Sharp­Brains friend and speak­ing at/ attend­ing any, please make sure to say Hello!

Have a great month of March.

As we announced last Octo­ber, Prac­tice­Wise, the com­pany that main­tains the Amer­i­can Acad­emy of Pedi­atrics “Evidence-based Child and Ado­les­cent Psycho-social Inter­ven­tions,” has ele­vated biofeed­back to “Level 1 — Best Sup­port” as an inter­ven­tion for Atten­tion & Hyper­ac­tiv­ity Behav­iors. Work­ing Mem­ory Train­ing stays at Level 2. It is impor­tant to note that those lev­els do not con­trast effect sizes or clin­i­cal effi­cacy per se, but qual­ity and over­all direc­tion of under­ly­ing research.

To check out the cur­rent edi­tion of the report: click HERE.  Read the rest of this entry »

Mind­ful­ness train­ing is an approach for enhanc­ing men­tal health and alle­vi­at­ing men­tal health dif­fi­cul­ties that is based on east­ern med­i­ta­tion tech­niques. The focus of mind­ful­ness train­ing is to increase one’s aware­ness of the present moment, enhance the non-judgmental obser­va­tion of one’s sur­round­ings, and decrease impul­sive and Read the rest of this entry »

(Editor’s Note: this is Part 2 of the con­ver­sa­tion between David Coleiro and Alvaro Fer­nan­dez on the future of brain health. You can read Part 1 Here)

Non-invasive tech­nolo­gies
There is now a grow­ing toolkit of non-invasive tech­nolo­gies which can be used in brain train­ing. Exam­ples of these include: Read the rest of this entry »

The Brain: On the Front­line of Dig­i­tal Health in the Work­place (Huff­in­g­ton Post):

“…It is esti­mated that some two bil­lion world­wide, one-third of the global pop­u­la­tion, suf­fer from brain-based health and pro­duc­tiv­ity chal­lenges with a related cost bur­den of more than $2 tril­lion. The broad scope of this mar­ket is empha­sized fur­ther when con­sid­er­a­tion is given to Read the rest of this entry »

Time for Sharp­Brains’ Novem­ber 2012 eNewslet­ter, fea­tur­ing lat­est sci­ence, tools and think­ing to upgrade brain health. Before we start, do you believe these 32 neu­romyths? Do we only use 10% of our brain?

New Sci­ence:

• Fast cycling can help Parkinson’s Dis­ease patients strengthen brain con­nec­tiv­ity for motor ability
• There’s no sin­gle sil­ver bul­let to treat depres­sion (not even aer­o­bic exercise)
• The cog­ni­tive and brain fit­ness ben­e­fits of being bilingual
• New­born neu­rons in the adult brain are crit­i­cal for learn­ing and memory
• Call­ing high school students/ teach­ers to design cre­ative exper­i­ments on the human brain

New Tools:

• Brain health cen­ters adding cog­ni­tive coach­ing services
• Study: Emerg­ing brain com­puter inter­face can mon­i­tor and train atten­tion in unmed­icated ADHD children
• 10–12 hours of med­i­ta­tion train­ing can improve daily-life emo­tional regulation
• On the lim­its of Citi­co­l­ine and the need for com­pre­hen­sive brain injury rehabilitation

New Think­ing:

• Do you believe these neu­romyths? Do we only use 10% of our brain?
• Smart pills as cog­ni­tive enhance­ment? Let’s first mon­i­tor neg­a­tive cog­ni­tive side-effects of com­mon medications
• Brains shape tech­nol­ogy as tech­nol­ogy shapes brains

Finally, a request to  reporters, ana­lysts and blog­gers read­ing this. As we’re prepar­ing to release a major mar­ket report, we’d like to ensure you are in our Media List. If you’re inter­ested in brain health & inno­va­tion and want to be noti­fied as soon as the report becomes avail­able, please Fill This Form and let us know a bit about the publication/s you are writ­ing for. Thank you!