U.K. Government Taps Motif Neurotech to Develop Therapeutic Brain-Computer Interface

The U.K.’s Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA) has granted Motif Neurotech a multi-million dollar award to develop therapeutic brain-computer interface (BCI) technology to treat cognitive and psychiatric conditions. The award will fund the creation of a neural device network designed to monitor and regulate mental and cognitive states without brain surgery.

The award is part of ARIA’s Precision Neurotechnologies program, led by program director Jacques Carolan.

“We are thrilled to have been to be a part of this important program,” Motif Neurotech CEO Jacob Robinson said. “This funding will allow us to accelerate our efforts to develop a general-purpose platform capable of accurately monitoring and regulating mental and cognitive states. The brain is an electrical organ. We believe that mental and cognitive disorders will be best treated by interacting with the brain in its native language.”

The technology planned with this funding could profoundly impact the treatment of cognitive, neurological, and psychiatric conditions by helping regulate brain states associated with mood, attention, and sleep. Part of this award will focus on making the technology more accessible to patients by designing implantation to be simple, rapid, and low risk. This work will also focus on improving the specificity of brain stimulation by targeting specific cell types, which could lead to more effective treatments with fewer side effects.

Related: Motif Neurotech Raises $19M for Pea-Sized Brain Implant to Treat Depression

The interface consists of a network of millimeter-sized wireless implants placed in the skull during a 20-minute procedure and designed to be cosmetically invisible. Without contacting the brain, each device will provide cell-type specific stimulation and electrical recording. Arrays like these could span the entire cortical surface, enabling regulation of brain-wide circuits in a way that meets the needs of each patient.

Motif Neurotech will collaborate with research partners under this grant to develop the technology. U.K. startup MintNeuro will help develop custom integrated circuits that will help miniaturize the implants. Kaiyuan Yang, an associate professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Rice University, will help design circuits for efficient wireless data and power transfer. The Robinson Lab at Rice University will support system integration and testing. Valentin Dragoi, an Electrical and Computer Engineering professor at Rice, the Rosemary and Daniel J. Harrison III Presidential Distinguished Chair in Neuroprosthetics at Houston Methodist, and professor of Neuroscience at Weill Cornell Medical College, will lead the preclinical animal studies.

Houston-based Motif Neurotech is a privately held neurotechnology company developing miniature neural devices to help people regulate their mood, attention, and cognition. Its first product—the DOT—is in clinical development and is designed to address treatment resistant depression (TRD), a condition affecting millions of people in the United States and tens of millions of people worldwide.

ARIA is an R&D funding agency created to unlock technological breakthroughs that benefit everyone. Created by an Act of U.K. Parliament and sponsored by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, we fund teams of scientists and engineers to pursue research at the edge of what is scientifically and technologically possible.