An Oura Ring for your brain? Neurable is working on it and Apple may be next

In the past few months, when I really had to do something, I made a special couple of headphones that could read my thoughts. Well, somehow. The headphones are equipped with a brain computer interface that absorbs electrical signals from my brain and uses algorithms to interpret this data. When my focus begins to slide, the headphones know it and an app tells me that I should take a break.

It sounds like a little outside of science fiction, but a decades of startup called Neurable is pioneer in technology and prepares to bring the brain tracking tricks to more devices. Earphones, glasses, helmet alles, which can preserve an electrode near your head, can provide a real-time data current about what is in it. NAable technology uses a combination of EEG sensors (electroencephalography) to collect brain data and algorithms to interpret these signals. The company now uses this data by measuring attention To pursue and improve brain health.

I would like to emphasize once again that this technology does not know its mind in terms of your thoughts. However, it knows when they are entertained or distracted and one day can recognize symptoms of depression or, at a much more consistent front, early signs of an Alzheimer disease.

I came across neurable On a longer mission To understand the future of health tracking technology by testing what is out there now. It is one that made me anxious, covered with intelligent rings and continuous glucose monitors, and More confused about the definition of well -being. This is because almost all health persecutors who are currently popular on the market are Apple Watches, Oura -Rings, Whoop bands – downstream sensors. They measure consequences such as increased heart rate or body temperature and not the basic cause of this condition. By typing directly into your brain waves, a brain-computer interface can sometimes recognize problems for years before your divers.

“Biologically, your brain is designed in such a way that you hide your weaknesses: it is an evolutionary effect,” said me the co -founder and CEO of Neurable, Ramses ALCAIDE, a neuroscientist. “But if you measure from the source, take these things as you occur instead of that there are finally downstream consequences, and that is the real advantage of measuring the brain.”

Other large technology companies also examine opportunities to include non-invasive brain computer interfaces in headphones. Apple quietly quietly a few years ago Applied for a patent for an airpod design This uses electrodes to monitor brain activity, and NextSense, which have emerged from Google's moon bulb. Will build Brain monitors on earphones based on the mass market. There was also a recent boom in the activities of invasive brain computer interfaces that were developed by companies and Elon Musks Neuralink And Even meta The implantation of surgically chips into people's brain. One can certainly say that this is currently not a mass marker approach.

While all of these mega market capitalization companies are thinking about the possibilities of their own brain-powered projects, Neel's is on the market. It's right now on my head and it works.

The cutting cap of Neurotech

From the Direct Brain Interface Labor from Michigan University In 2015, Neel initially planned to penetrate the game industry. EEG sensors used an early version of its technology in a VR headset To run the world's first brain in the world But weakened before starting on wearables A wild Successful Indiegogo campaign For a futuristic headphones. This attracted the attention of the large hardware manufacturers and a partnership with Master & Dynamic.

The Master & Dynamic MW75 neuro-das I tested headphones of $ 700 looks like any other set of headphones for noise, with the exception of the badge with the inscription “Powered by Nonable AI”. If you connect you to the Nearly app, it will be fun when it is fun.

In the Neurable app there is a small video game with which you can fly a rocket ship with your brain – and serves as evidence of the concept. The trick is that you have to concentrate on a number of numbers on the screen. The more intensely you concentrate, the higher the numbers and the faster the rocket ship flies. If you start thinking about flying a real rocket ship, for example, the numbers decrease and the rocket ship slows down. It is one of the coolest innovations I've ever seen, if only because it's so easy.

The EEG sensors in Neurable products can absorb a number of brain wave frequencies associated with different behavior and activities. The beta frequency band provides some information about the state of attention and anxiety, while Alpha gives a spirit in peace.

While EEG sensors and brain computer interfaces are most frequently seen in laboratories, these sensors that carry every day can integrate into a device to change our understanding of the mind. “Non-invasive EEG is cheap and completely safe” I amProfessor of biomedical engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, whose laboratory built a drone that they can fly with their minds Over a decade ago. “However, the AI or the profound technology has improved the performance of drastically [brain-computer interfaces] Read the thoughts of individuals. “

If you have changed the mission of technology from measuring the focus on, for example, symptoms of depression, you can imagine how an everyday device could offer some life -changing interventions. The possibilities are as endless as the list of problems that the brain can affect. The Pentagon used the portable technology of NAABLE to examine traumatic head injuries For example in soldiers and this research, practical applications could have practical applications. Alcaide also mentioned Alzheimer's and Parkinson's as potential destinations for their technology. The symptoms for these diseases do not occur for years after the start, but early markers could appear in the type of EEG data that captures their technology from daily wear.

Currently, the MW75 -Neuro headphones are mainly used for the sharpness of their attention -with the new and additional advantage that they give a snapshot of their brain health. This includes a session with the headphones and allows the sensors to collect the electrical signals that sends their brain. Your focus is measured as low, medium or high, and if you penetrate for a while, the app asks you to take a break. You can also switch on a function called biofeedback that plays music with different intensity to put your focus on the high area. The brain health reports are still in Beta mode, but show you daily estimates that make it in relation to things such as anxiety, cognitive speed and vigilance.

The way you know that the device does not actually read your mind depends on science and a strong data directive. The technology of NAable takes the raw voltage out of its actual thoughts from its neurons and uses AI to decode the data and identify signals that are connected to the focus, the company's co-founder, Adam Molnar, explained to me recently. Neurable encrypted and anonymizes the data that comes from your head and sensors, and then again when you go to your phone so that it is far away from personal data. In addition, NAABLE has no ambitions to be a data company.

“Our business model does not depend on the identity. We do not sell any advertisements. So there is no advantage,” said Molnar. “It is actually more of a liability for us to return data card to a person.”

It is difficult for me to say how much more productive I became thanks to the brain reading headphones. As with many other health persecutors, there is a kind of placebo cat effect: the decision to simply pursue the behavior changed my state of mind and behave in a certain way. So when I set up a focus session, I inevitably pay more attention to how well I concentrated, how often I took breaks and whether I decided to be more mindful.

That actually makes me so curious about an earphone version of what NAable does. I wear most of the day of Airpod, regardless of whether it was working, listened to podcasts or simply drown out the noises outside of my apartment in Brooklyn. If these earphones also collect data about my cognitive well -being in all these activities, I would be interested to know what I could relieve of this information, if only to understand it better What rotted my brain?. And I am sure that many companies would like to collect more data about the intellectual states of their users at all times. Imagine that the Tikok algorithm knew that you were not interested in something – not because you did through it, but also because your brain waves said this.

The NAables website website offers mockups from EEG-equipped earphones, helmets and intelligent glasses, and it is clear that the company strives to go beyond its first product. The company also doesn't just want to make devices. It wants to be the leading platform for brain technology. “Just like Bluetooth in every single device and every access to Bluetooth, we believe that every access to Neuro Tech should have,” said Alcaide.

“There are so many things that you can do with Neuro Tech, regardless of whether it is the health conditions, whether it is controlling devices, whether it is better,” he said. “It would be a bad service for the world if the only solutions that came out were our own.”

Neurable is indeed one of many Startups that try to bring neuro technology to the masses, even though they are the only ones selling a product that I would actually wear in public. Several other EEG-based devices out there take the shape of Frontal ligamentsMany of them are geared towards sleep health or meditation. A company called EmotiveWhat also worked with Master & Dynamic will start selling His own EEG-equipped earphones this autumn. It remains to be seen whether and when Apple Airpods will be read in the brain, but they have already teamed up with a startup of the brain interface called synchronously, which enables humans Check iPhones with your thoughts (Don't you always have one with your iPhone?)

Here we return to the point where science fiction hits reality. We are removed from the most distant applications of brain computer interfaces years, but we go in this direction. Whether this future looks miraculous or like A Black mirror Consequence Lies with us – and for the companies, like NAable, pioneering work.

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