Dear col­league,

It’s remark­able how quick­ly things are chang­ing, final­ly, in brain health and men­tal health — see for exam­ple what’s new with Inter­ax­on, Akili, Neu­raMetrix, Apple, Calm, Halo Neu­ro­science, Mind­strong Health, Novar­tis, Pear Ther­a­peu­tics, and life­long neu­ro­ge­n­e­sis, all in the last 6 months!

Please enjoy the May edi­tion of Sharp­Brains eNewslet­ter below, and con­sid­er join­ing the Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit this Decem­ber to dis­cuss the lat­est and help shape the next 🙂

New research:

• Cog­ni­tive train­ing, diet, exer­cise, and vas­cu­lar man­age­ment seen to improve cog­ni­tion even in peo­ple with genet­ic pre­dis­po­si­tion for demen­tia (APOE e4)
• Brain imag­ing show that patients with Alzheimer’s dis­ease can still remem­ber and enjoy their favorite songs
• Phys­i­cal exer­cise doesn’t slow down demen­tia once it appears, study shows

New tools:

• Ini­tial study finds promise and lim­i­ta­tions in using vir­tu­al real­i­ty (VR) to treat ADHD
• tDCS com­ing to an Equinox gym near you: Good, Bad or Depends?
• Could tech­nol­o­gy help cure depres­sion among old­er adults? (Short answer: Yes)

New thinking:

• Six tips for social-emo­tion­al learn­ing (SEL) to trans­fer into real-world skills
• Large study to assess impact on ear­ly brain devel­op­ment of finan­cial assis­tance to low-income moth­ers
• New book high­lights con­tin­ued brain devel­op­ment through­out ado­les­cence, even into our 20s
• Pre­sen­ta­tion on Neu­ro­science, Edu­ca­tion and Life­long Learn­ing (in Span­ish)

Have a great month of June,

The Sharp­Brains Team

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We are proud to share what’s already shap­ing up to be a quite spec­tac­u­lar and unique Speak­ing Ros­ter at the 2017 Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit, start­ing with Thomas R. lnsel, MD, a psy­chi­a­trist, neu­ro­sci­en­tist, and cur­rent­ly a co-founder and Pres­i­dent of Mind­strong Health. From 2002–2015, Dr. Insel served as Direc­tor of the Nation­al Insti­tute of Men­tal Health (NIMH), Read the rest of this entry »

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Hun­dreds of com­pa­nies around the globe, now includ­ing Elon Musk’s Neu­ralink and even Face­book,  are research­ing and devel­op­ing new ways to help brain own­ers be smarter, sharp­er, and health­i­er.

What explains this flur­ry of activ­i­ty? Where may it be head­ed?

To help you under­stand what’s going on, let me high­light five key facts that emerged from the recent Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit.

Fact 1. There are 7.5 billion human brains out there, and everyone needs help

Con­sid­er all unmet needs derived from the tra­di­tion­al phar­ma-exclu­sive approach to brain health.

Learn­ing and cog­ni­tive dis­abil­i­ties in chil­dren are grow­ing sig­nif­i­cant­ly, from ADHD and OCD, to autism. The relat­ed emo­tion­al and eco­nom­ic bur­den is sub­stan­tial — yet, over 60–70% of those with treat­ment have poor out­comes, and many who need help don’t get any.

Glob­al­ly, around 350 mil­lion peo­ple suf­fer from depres­sion. Add to that sub­stance abuse, and we are talk­ing hun­dreds of mil­lions of peo­ple with­out prop­er care and very high relapse rates for the lucky ones get­ting help.

Con­cus­sions and brain impair­ments per­vade through mil­lions of vet­er­ans and high-con­tact sports prac­ti­tion­ers, yet diag­no­sis and treat­ments are elu­sive.

And let’s not for­get the per­fect­ly healthy. Read the rest of this entry »

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Hun­dreds of com­pa­nies and sci­ence labs around the globe are research­ing the inner work­ings of the human brain and mind, and devel­op­ing new ways to help brain own­ers be smarter, sharp­er, and health­i­er for longer.

What explains this flur­ry of activ­i­ty? Read the rest of this entry »

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Last year I got very inter­est­ed in the func­tion­ing of the human brain and the sci­ence behind mind­ful­ness and learn­ing [1], so was quite excit­ed  to attend the Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit [2] in Decem­ber, indulging in the lat­est trends in applied neu­ro­science and dig­i­tal inno­va­tion.

The Sum­mit focused on the theme of rein­vent­ing brain health in the dig­i­tal age, and brought togeth­er lead­ing researchers, entre­pre­neurs, financiers and pol­i­cy­mak­ers pas­sion­ate with the mis­sion of mov­ing neu­ro­science and cog­ni­tive research from sci­ence labs towards appli­ca­tions in Health, Well­ness and Edu­ca­tion. Here’s a sum­ma­ry of the many things I dis­cov­ered. Read the rest of this entry »