How About Tech That Changes How You Think (Literally)?
It’s been a long time coming, but with Apple getting into the smart watch game, it looks like wearable technology is about to take off.
Most talk about ‘wearable’ tech tends to focus on the external. Your watch, like your smartphone, is a tool that you look at and interact with—you just so happen to be wearing it. That’s true even for the more immersive wearables, like the Oculus Rift or Google Glass headsets. While those devices might make it seem like you’re entering another world, in actuality they are just affecting what you see.
What isn’t so familiar is technology that can affect us internally.
Last Wednesday, tech startup Thync, founded by a postgraduate fellow from Harvard and an MIT graduate, announced it has raised $13 million for technology that can tell your brain to chill out or increase energy.
For the past three years, the founders, Jamie Taylor and Isy Goldwasser, had wanted to create a device that would impact consumers’ daily lives. Thync is designing some sort of product that will use neurosignaling to shift a person’s state of mind.
“A lot of people think that the brain is a black box,’’ Taylor told Boston.com. “We know much more about the brain than we appreciate. We understand what gets people more energy… We understand the processes and pathways that are involved in many of those things, so we decided to intersect that knowledge.’’
Thync’s product is shrouded in mystery, but according to BetaBoston, it won’t be a headset. The creators are discussing ways to make sure their product fits into the guidelines of the Food and Drug Administration, according to Taylor. In other words, they’re seeking approval for the product to be considered like a drug.
Thync’s technology wouldn’t be the first to be used as a mood or brain enhancer.
Foc.us—a headset for gamers designed to help them, well, focus—markets itself as an entertainment product.
Another headset, Muse, measures brain activity so users can track their brainwaves to learn how to manage stress and stay calm. Muse markets the product as a “brain fitness tool’’ but doesn’t claim to heal anything, only to teach the wearer how to help themselves.
Other headsets have been used in research settings but have not yet taken the plunge to the public, like one from Vanderbilt University that could use electrical currents to enhance or slow down a person’s ability to learn.
Natasha Schull, an associate professor of Science, Technology, and Society at MIT, told Boston.com that Thync’s product is unique in the sense that it’s less interactive. Instead, the product would act upon the user—kind of like a drug. That’s where the FDA issues might come in.
“If you go to electronics shows or gaming conferences, the big discussion at those venues is the FDA issue,’’ said Schull. “These technologies could be almost identical, and one is marketing itself as entertainment while one is marketing as medical.’’
Although the project is still a work in progress with human trials going on at a Boston office (Thync itself is based in California), the company is hoping to release the product by next year.
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