healthcare

Neurotech start-up Paradromics raises $20M to address brain-related disorders via next-gen brain-computer interfaces

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Neu­ralink Com­peti­tor Rais­es $20 Mil­lion for Brain Implants (Bloomberg):

A com­peti­tor to Elon Musk’s Neu­ralink said it raised $20 mil­lion, enough to get it on track to intro­duce a new gen­er­a­tion of pow­er­ful and tiny elec­trodes to the human brain.

Paradromics Inc., found­ed in 2015 about a year ahead of Neu­ralink, is build­ing brain-com­put­er inter­faces that could help peo­ple with dis­or­ders rang­ing from paral­y­sis to speech imped­i­ments. [Read more…] about Neu­rotech start-up Paradromics rais­es $20M to address brain-relat­ed dis­or­ders via next-gen brain-com­put­er interfaces

Fast Forward to 2040: How to prepare for the new era in brain enhancement that will change the way we think, work, and heal

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Decades from now when our aug­ment­ed brains have enhanced our cog­ni­tive func­tion and trans­formed near­ly every aspect of our lives, many of us will look back and won­der why we didn’t do more to pre­pare for these inevitable changes. Gov­ern­ment lead­ers may grap­ple with the run­away effects of AI and brain enhance­ment on geopol­i­tics. Com­pa­nies that fail to incor­po­rate neu­rotech­nolo­gies and BCI into their oper­a­tional flow could lose sig­nif­i­cant mar­ket share and be forced to scram­ble in an attempt to regain a foothold in an indus­try they once dominated.

Work­ers who don’t heed the warn­ings to re-skill or upskill may find them­selves out of a job as entire indus­tries dis­ap­pear. Grad­u­at­ing col­lege stu­dents may dis­cov­er their field of study is no longer rel­e­vant in the busi­ness world, leav­ing them unpre­pared for the chang­ing job mar­ket. Tech inno­va­tors could be caught up in fierce com­pe­ti­tion to snap up employ­ees from a very lim­it­ed tal­ent pool, dri­ving up the cost of inno­va­tion and ham­per­ing its devel­op­ment. And every­day cit­i­zens may be wrestling with the unex­pect­ed con­se­quences of unin­ten­tion­al­ly giv­ing away the rights to their neur­al data.

Rest assured, it doesn’t have to be this way. [Read more…] about Fast For­ward to 2040: How to pre­pare for the new era in brain enhance­ment that will change the way we think, work, and heal

Mindstrong Health recruits slew of Silicon Valley talent

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– Mind­strong Health is apply­ing machine learn­ing meth­ods on human-smart­phone inter­ac­tions to iden­ti­fy dig­i­tal phe­no­typ­ing fea­tures that could be clin­i­cal­ly useful.

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Mind­strong Health Expands Exec­u­tive Team to Advance Tech­nol­o­gy for New Vir­tu­al Men­tal Health Care Mod­el (press release):

“Mind­strong Health, a health­care inno­va­tion com­pa­ny ded­i­cat­ed to trans­form­ing men­tal health through inno­va­tions in dig­i­tal mea­sure­ment and vir­tu­al care mod­els, today announced the addi­tion of ten senior exec­u­tives to its lead­er­ship team includ­ing CEO Daniel Graf, who joined the com­pa­ny in Octo­ber 2019.”

On top of Mr. Graf, Mind­strong Health has also recruit­ed: [Read more…] about Mind­strong Health recruits slew of Sil­i­con Val­ley talent

December 5–6th in Dublin: 2nd European Annual Virtual Reality and Healthcare Symposium

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Just a heads-up about a great event lat­er this week in Dublin, Ire­land, for those work­ing on vir­tu­al and aug­ment­ed real­i­ty and health­care innovation.

When: Thu Dec 5, 2019 8:00 am — Fri Dec 6, 2019 5:00 pm.

Where: Dav­en­port Hotel

Featured sessions include:

[Read more…] about Decem­ber 5–6th in Dublin: 2nd Euro­pean Annu­al Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty and Health­care Symposium

Apple/ Eli Lilly’s bet: Wearable and mobile consumer devices may well help us detect cognitive impairment and dementia

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Apple, Eli Lil­ly research whether devices can detect demen­tia signs (Health­care Dive):

“Demen­tia, which affects rough­ly 47 mil­lion peo­ple across the globe, costs $1 tril­lion world­wide, accord­ing to the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion. Ear­ly test­ing for the con­di­tion is spo­radic and, when con­duct­ed, it’s often not sen­si­tive enough to detect ear­ly stages of men­tal decline, cre­at­ing an oppor­tu­ni­ty for tech com­pa­nies like Apple to see whether they can turn a profit.

The “rich, lon­gi­tu­di­nal infor­ma­tion” from wear­able and mobile con­sumer devices can be [Read more…] about Apple/ Eli Lilly’s bet: Wear­able and mobile con­sumer devices may well help us detect cog­ni­tive impair­ment and dementia

Update: 200 common prescription medications increase depression risk

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Dear read­er,

Time for Sharp­Brains e‑newsletter.

It’s been a busy month, once again bring­ing to the fore­front the lim­i­ta­tions of our cur­rent health­care sys­tem and, on the pos­i­tive side, the grow­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to improve Brain Health and Men­tal Health for all, if we pay atten­tion to (and act on) lat­est research, think­ing and tools.

New research:

New thinking:

New tools:

 

Final­ly, we invite you to tease your mind with these four opti­cal illu­sions. Sur­pris­ing, aren’t they?

Have a great month of July,

 

The Sharp­Brains Team