NYC Neuromodec: Pre-Conference Thoughts (Pt 1)

What’s it about?

July 31st marks the opening day of the 2024 NYC Neuromodulation Conference. From the conference’s homepage, the goal is to “provide attendees with insights into the most timely and important advances in neurotechnology / neuromodulation” including but not limited to neuronal biomarkers (personalised neuromodulation), invasive and non-invasive stimulation techniques and their clinical applications, BCIs, and much more. (See full breakdown here: https://neuromodec.org/nyc-neuromodulation-2024/)

The excitement is real! The goal is to bring together researchers, technologists, and clinicians to inspire innovation and collaboration. BCIs and closed loop neurostimulation systems have taken my keen interest in the last few months. This conference could not have come sooner!

The Attendees

I expect the majority of the attendees to be involved with academic research with a minority of application builders, hobbyists, and startups. Given the nascent stage of the technologies, I will be surprised to see a large investor presence however you never know; good investors are ultimately good forecasters of the future so let’s see how many of them believe in the commercial value of brain-based technologies.

Exciting Talks I’m Looking Forward To

My pre-conference interest is piqued on application development via closed loop BCI systems – a closed loop as in a system that measures activity from the brain, interprets how to stimulate it for a desired outcome, and produces the stimulative signal, monitoring the outcome and reducing or increasing the signal accordingly. Such a stimulation can come in various forms – magnetic, electrical, ultrasound etc. These systems remove the need for any external input and are self contained by purely measuring brain activity. This deeply fascinates me and hence, some of the key talks I am looking forward to with an emphasis on building applications are:

• Brain Stimulation, Oscillations, and Closing the Loop moderated by Daria Antonenko, PhD at 4–5pm on Thursday August 1st;
• The following morning on Friday August 2nd, Lucas Parra, PhD has an interesting question I’d like to learn more about: Can transcranial electric stimulation with multiple electrodes reach deep targets?

It’ll be interesting to find out whether or not we are going to be hardware limited in the application of non-invasive neuronal technologies. The thickness of the human skull is a huge barrier but I hope to hear of innovative signal processing techniques that can reduce its restrictive effects to better technologies.

• Although plenty of other talks seem extremely interesting, a final talk that caught my eye is by Alexander Opitz, Phd titled “Frequency-specific effects of transcranial alternating current stimulation are explained by network dynamics”
• I have heard of direct and alternating current stimulation techniques. I have always been under the impression that the amplitude and spatial direction of the current is a key factor in producing neuronal responses however I had never considered the possibility that the *frequency* of the current could be a key factor in outcomes too. Something of an ‘unknown unknown’ to me. I hope this one is as interesting as it seems.

I intend to attend each of the above, and more, and document the most interesting insights from each in a blog each day for the coming 4 days.

Themes and Topics

A quick breakdown of various focal points in the different areas of research:

Simulation Techniques

• Finer targeting – reaching the region of interest and producing the intended effects with more focused targeting of voxels
• Effects and limitations of various stimulation techniques (from transcranial current and magnetic stimulation (tDCS and tMS) to deep brain stimulation (DBS) and spinal cord stimulation)
• Improved and advancing imaging techniques to better isolate regions of interest

Biomarkers

Biomarkers, from my understanding, are essentially observable biological phenomena who’s presence indicate the potential likelihood of particular medical conditions.

• Biomarkers of Depression
• Biomarkers of Addiction
• Application of stimulation techniques mentioned above to the aforementioned brain abnormalities
• a tDCS treatment for addiction in development will be discussed by Michael Nitsche, MD – I think this angle will be critical for application builders and hobbyists such as myself – understanding what the key medical problems are. The success of endeavours in this field in the future will be predicated on sector specialist comparison; medical professionals, scientists, developers, and engineers must come together. Medical professionals like Dr Nitsche are key for technologists to understand what the high value and high potential problems in medicine are.

Commercial BCIs and A Personal Goal

I could not specifically find any pertaining to *commercial* BCIs but it’s one of my main goals during this conference to find 2–3 other enthusiasts/builders who are interested in the future commercialisation of these technologies.

As I mentioned, It seems pretty clear from the list of talks and workshops that the predominant majority of attendees are in the academic network. However, I suspect some other neuro-geeks like myself will be attracted. I hope to find them and find out what the ‘builder view’ of brain-based technologies is. **What scope is there to start building fully fledged software applications in this space?** If you’ve read my previous article you know I use the Neurosity Crown, but how feasible is it to build full blown commercial applications with it?

My view is that these commercial EEG devices are tools that, soon, a small but active community of application designers will build various technologies on top of. I think the companies designing these headsets have not fully cultivated a market for mass use. At the moment it is only developers like me really that use them. But in the future I think us developers will start building applications that a wider population of users will use (games, IOT devices controlled by the mind, mind-controlled phone dialers/texters and so on). The companies creating the headsets ultimately need to focus on the hardware, creating a seamless sandbox for application testing, and open the doors for the developers and enthusiasts to find meaningful user applications. I foresee the nascent commercial market proceeding this way.

Hence, meeting these builder types here at NYC Neuromodulation 2024 is a central goal of mine.

Closing Remarks

An inch wide but miles deep. There is a lot of research on display and a lot of avenues being explored. I haven’t done the full breadth of research justice with my summarisation but there is a lot to be learned in the coming days. Stay tuned! I’m excited to share whatever fascinating learnings I come by.