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Posted by Zack Lynch

From prefix to adjective and now David Brooks makes "the Neuro" a noun. The meme lives.

Posted by Zack Lynch

The Neurotech Development Foundation is organizing a Translational Neurotech Summit on May 18, 2010. This one day gathering of scientists, entrepreneurs, executives and investors will be held coordination with The 5th annual Neurotech Investing and Partnering Conference May 19-20, 2010. The goal of the summit is to facilitate the movement of promising neurotechnology (pharmaceuticals, biologics, cell-based therapeutics, devices and diagnostics) from universities, government labs and research institutes into the private sector.

CALL FOR SPEAKERS
Showcase your translational research project to potential investors and partners:
* Cutting edge research projects ready for investment or hand off to industry (preclinical or clinical)
* Pharmaceuticals, biologics, cell therapies, devices, and diagnostics
* Presenter abstracts accepted from October 1 through January 5, 2010
* Presenters notified by February 15 and coached on presentation, partnering, and start-up strategy
* Presentations selected based on quality of research, interest to industry, and fit with program
* Presentations will be 10 minutes plus Q&A with session panel

The summit will feature the top researchers from across translational neuroscience including Alzheimer's, addiction, ALS, anxiety, depressive disorders, epilepsy, migraine, mild cognitive impairment, Huntington's, multiple sclerosis, obesity, pain, Parkinson's, schizophrenia, age-related macular degeneration, sensory disorders, sleep disorders, and stroke. Download Fillable Presenter Submission Form

Steering Committee:
-Casey Lynch, Managing Director, NeuroInsights & President, Neurotech Development Foundation
-Frank Eeckman, MD, PhD Consultant, NeuroInsights
-Jill Heemskerk, PhD, Program Director, Office of Translational Research, NINDS/NIH
-Charles Jennings, PhD, Director of McGovern Institute Neurotechnology Program, MIT
-Zack Lynch, Executive Director, Neurotechnology Industry Organization
-Dan O'Connell, Managing Director, NeuroVentures Capital
-Gail Schechter, PhD, Director Center for Bioentrepreneurship at UCSF
-Guy Seabrook, PhD, Head of Neuroscience External Basic Research, Eli Lilly

The summit is hosted by the Neurotechnology Development Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit created to accelerate the development of treatments for the brain and nervous system by promoting translation of basic research.

Posted by Zack Lynch

Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn have joined forces to publish "Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women" which was released earlier this month. I just ordered my copy. Here is their reasoning why.

IN THE 19TH CENTURY, the paramount moral challenge was slavery. In the 20th century, it was totalitarianism. In this century, it is the brutality inflicted on so many women and girls around the globe: sex trafficking, acid attacks, bride burnings and mass rape.

Yet if the injustices that women in poor countries suffer are of paramount importance, in an economic and geopolitical sense the opportunity they represent is even greater. “Women hold up half the sky,” in the words of a Chinese saying, yet that’s mostly an aspiration: in a large slice of the world, girls are uneducated and women marginalized, and it’s not an accident that those same countries are disproportionately mired in poverty and riven by fundamentalism and chaos. There’s a growing recognition among everyone from the World Bank to the U.S. military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff to aid organizations like CARE that focusing on women and girls is the most effective way to fight global poverty and extremism. That’s why foreign aid is increasingly directed to women. The world is awakening to a powerful truth: Women and girls aren’t the problem; they’re the solution."

I couldn't agree more.

Posted by Zack Lynch

A few weeks ago I participated in a day long discussion at the Institute for the Future in Palo Alto around the topic of When Everything is Programmable. Lots of very interesting scenarios and viewpoints were shared. For my part, I stuck to the theme of our emerging neurosociety. Towards the end of the day each of us were asked to write up a 10 year scenario focused on our area of expertise. Jake Dunagan, IFTF's Director of Technology Horizons Program and fellow neurofuturist joined me in sketching out this scenario which touches on a whole set of emerging issues. This is not meant to be comprehensive, more so a quick sketch we put together in 45 minutes.

September 13, 2019 President Signs NINA (Neuro Information Nondiscrimination Act)

Inspired by the GINA (Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act) legislation passed in 2008, NINA might include areas such as:

-Explicit right to cognitive liberty, brain privacy
-Bans discrimination in hiring based on neuroimaging profile
-Bans all local, state 'drug vaccine' programs
-Bans 'neuroprofiling' for travel and attendance at public events
-Subsidizes accelerated learning with neuroenablement technologies
-Legalizes use of neuroenablers
-Bans denial of health coverage based on neuroprofile
-Bans cosmetic memory erasure

The scenario is being accelerated by the development of more sophisticated imaging technologies, neuroinformatic analysis algorithms, neurofeedback technologies, research into neuroplasticity, drug vaccine, neuropharma and neurodevice R&D.

The reason this scenario was seen as important to sketch out was that right now we have a whole host of technologies that are emerging without an effective policy infrastructure. There will be severe unintended consequences as technologies accelerate across a wide variety of enabling disciplines and national governments may eventually need to step in to protect their populations and their basic human rights.

Posted by Zack Lynch

Big brain thinkers are aggregating in Berlin over next few days for the Decade of the Mind V Conference. The three themes are Education (how neuroscience can aid educational research and policy); Social Policy (how neuroeconomics can inform public policy); and Health (neurotech developments for brain related illness).