These days, you can’t go any­where with­out hear­ing about how tech­nol­o­gy is ruin­ing every­thing, includ­ing our hap­pi­ness. There is some truth to this, but it’s not the whole sto­ry.

Tech­nol­o­gy can be bad for us—for exam­ple, when social media gives us FOMO (fear of miss­ing out) or traps us in fil­ter bub­bles that pre­vent us from see­ing mul­ti­ple points of view on impor­tant issues. As a soci­ety, we are increas­ing­ly con­cerned that tech­nolo­gies like smart­phones and social media result in more social com­par­i­son, bul­ly­ing, and loneliness—all stum­bling blocks to hap­pi­ness. Tech­nol­o­gy seems to be bad for our hap­pi­ness when it inter­feres with the men­tal, social, emo­tion­al, and behav­ioral process­es that con­tribute to well-being.

But we often fail to real­ize (and dis­cuss) the ways that tech­nol­o­gy can also sup­port hap­pi­ness and well-being—for exam­ple Read the rest of this entry »

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While sit­ting at din­ner with an unsus­pect­ing friend, my phone blew up with odd­ly-late mes­sages from fel­low neu­rotech­nol­o­gy com­rades. CTRL-Labs announced their impend­ing acqui­si­tion by Face­book and inte­gra­tion into Face­book Real­i­ty Labs (respon­si­ble for Ocu­lus et al.), for enough mon­ey to buy my guilt-induc­ing­ly-expen­sive New York cof­fee for a mea­ger 550,000 years. Woah—so very many ques­tions. I fig­ured I’d share Read the rest of this entry »

The Sea Hero Quest vir­tu­al real­i­ty game is played on a Sam­sung Gear VR head­set. Source: Glitch­ers Ltd.

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The Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty Game Gath­er­ing Data for Demen­tia Researchers (Bloomberg):

“Nav­i­gat­ing an ice-walled lake or scour­ing a swamp for a hid­den mon­ster may sound like a fun premise for a vir­tu­al-real­i­ty video game. But there’s a seri­ous pur­pose behind the new game Sea Hero Quest VR: help­ing neu­ro­sci­en­tists design a new test for demen­tia. Read the rest of this entry »

Researchers use brain imag­ing and machine learn­ing to pre­dict which high-risk infants will devel­op autism. Cred­it: Car­oli­na Insti­tute for Devel­op­men­tal Dis­abil­i­ties.

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Time for Sharp­Brains’ June e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing fas­ci­nat­ing sci­en­tif­ic find­ings, promis­ing assess­ments, ther­a­pies and brain health mon­i­tor­ing tools…and some fun opti­cal illu­sions 🙂

New research

• Study com­bines neu­roimag­ing with machine learn­ing to pre­dict, with 96% accu­ra­cy, whether high-risk 6‑month-old babies will devel­op autism spec­trum dis­or­der (ASD) by age 2
• Cog­ni­tive Train­ing or Gingko Bilo­ba to pre­vent cog­ni­tive decline and demen­tia? New com­pre­hen­sive report by the Nation­al Acad­e­mies of Sci­ences, Engi­neer­ing, and Med­i­cine clar­i­fies pri­or­i­ties for pub­lic health and for future research
• Neu­roimag­ing study finds exten­sive brain rewiring–in just six months–among illit­er­ate adults learn­ing to read and write
• Chil­dren with ADHD should be reeval­u­at­ed each year, since atten­tion prob­lems per­ceived by teach­ers are far less sta­ble than we imag­ine

New tools

• Mind­strong Health rais­es $14 mil­lion to mod­ern­ize the diag­no­sis and treat­ment of neu­ropsy­chi­atric dis­or­ders via arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) and smart­phones
• The FDA cre­ates new Dig­i­tal Health unit to reimag­ine reg­u­la­to­ry paths in the age of scal­able, AI-enhanced inno­va­tion
• Neu­rotech start-up Rythm rais­es $11 mil­lion more to devel­op and com­mer­cial­ize sleep-mon­i­tor­ing head­band Dreem
• Savonix rais­es $5.1 mil­lion to com­mer­cial­ize mobile neu­rocog­ni­tive assess­ment in the US, Chi­na and Japan
• The dual chal­lenge ahead of Facebook’s Typ­ing-by-Brain project: 1) devel­op the neu­rotech­nol­o­gy, 2) devel­op the sci­ence

New thinking

• In hon­or of Alzheimer’s & Brain Aware­ness Month, let’s dis­cuss 10 Key Facts To Har­ness Brain Plas­tic­i­ty And Pro­long Brain Health
• 11 ear­ly-stage neu­rotech entre­pre­neurs receive award by The Ontario Brain Insti­tute (OBI)
• Com­ing soon near you: Smart­phones, fridges and cars with emo­tion­al intel­li­gence
• 5 Must-Read Arti­cles, and an Online Course, to Help Chil­dren with ADHD
• Mea­sur­ing phys­i­o­log­i­cal responses–including brain activity–to design stim­u­lat­ing, “con­scious” cities

Upcoming Events

• Brain Health Chal­lenge by MIT Solve (Sub­mis­sions due August 1st)
• Brain­Fu­tures 2017: Sep­tem­ber 6–7th in Wash­ing­ton, DC
• 2017 Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit: Brain Enhance­ment in the Dig­i­tal Age (Decem­ber 5–7th, 2017)

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Final­ly, you may want to Test your Brain and Mind with these 9 Clas­sic Opti­cal Illu­sions 🙂

Have a great sum­mer!

The Sharp­Brains Team

Direc­tor of Typ­ing-by-Brain Project Dis­cuss­es How Face­book Will Get Inside Your Head (IEEE Spec­trum):

“When Facebook’s Mark Chevil­let describes the company’s new “typ­ing by brain” ini­tia­tive, he has a way of keep­ing it from sound­ing total­ly crazy Read the rest of this entry »