New virtual reality platforms for brain health assessments and therapies: Oculus Rift, Morpheus

Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty is Here. Can We Play With It? (The New York Times):

“…I can assure you that vir­tu­al real­i­ty works. Tech­nol­o­gy is no longer the lim­i­ta­tion. The lin­ger­ing ques­tion is what game design­ers, artists and film­mak­ers should do with it…Oculus VR sold 60,000 copies of its first devel­op­ment kit…This year (it) began fac­ing pub­lic com­pe­ti­tion for the first time, most notably in the form of Sony’s Project Mor­pheus for the PlaySta­tion 4.”

Com­ment: Part of that “lin­ger­ing ques­tion” –espe­cial­ly now that Face­book is buy­ing Ocu­lus– is, How will sci­en­tists, entre­pre­neurs and prac­ti­tion­ers lever­age these new con­sumer-friend­ly plat­forms to devel­op and mar­ket much need­ed brain health assess­ments and therapies?

Face­book Buy­ing Ocu­lus Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty Com­pa­ny for $2 Bil­lion (Time):

“Though the Rift has been pitched as a video gam­ing device, Face­book plans to use its tech­nol­o­gy for com­mu­ni­ca­tions, media and oth­er forms of enter­tain­ment. In a con­fer­ence call with ana­lysts, Zucker­berg said vir­tu­al real­i­ty has the poten­tial to be the next great com­put­ing evo­lu­tion, fol­low­ing the tran­si­tion from desk­top com­put­ers to mobile devices…In a post on his Face­book pro­file page, Zucker­berg pre­sent­ed such sce­nar­ios as sit­ting court­side at a sports event, study­ing with a group of stu­dents or con­sult­ing face-to-face with a doc­tor as poten­tial uses for vir­tu­al reality.”

Relat­ed articles:

• Daniel Fer­gu­son: Big Data opens a world of oppor­tu­ni­ty in health, psy­chol­o­gy, neuroscience
• Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty Games Help Stroke Patients Recov­er Motor Functions
• How to inte­grate neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty-based inter­ven­tions with exist­ing stan­dards of care