In addition to its longitudinal research and collective impact work, the Brain Health Initiative (BHI) will develop the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator. This will be a first-of-its-kind hub for breakthrough science in brain health science and innovation!
Accelerator of ideas and innovation
The Brain Health Innovation Accelerator aims to provide the space and opportunity for experts from various fields, backgrounds, and viewpoints to come together for one collaborative vision. As a team, these experts will contribute their unique knowledge, talent, and skills with the goal to tackle a major health issue: how to systemically and sustainably enhance brain health and optimize brain performance across the lifespan.
The focus will be on the utilization of innovative assessment, intervention, and monitoring technology and other solutions that has the potential to increase outcomes across the primary pillars of brain health, such as physical activity and fitness, stress resilience, nutrition, sleep, social engagement, cognitive training, emotional well-being, and general health. In addition, the science of habit change will be investigated and integrated with the goal to increase the likelihood of adherence and sustainable adoption of brain healthy lifestyle behaviors.
Living laboratory
This living laboratory plans to engage residents, young and old, throughout brain healthy communities. In addition, it will bring together a global team of national and international brain health experts, including innovators and engineers from many fields (such as neurotechnology, robotics, artificial intelligence, digital health), brain wellness clinicians and health coaches, scholars, entrepreneurs, and investors to validate brain health solutions and evaluate for commercialization purposes.
We expect facilitators and senior advisors to partner with these teams to rapidly iterate novel ideas and brain health and performance innovations, while balancing them within current state of the art scientific methodology.
Economic opportunity
Once a brain health innovation is validated, the successful development of commercial applications requires real-world application and evaluation. For example, there is a global explosion in relevant brain health patents and grants, including neurotechnology that is non-invasive (not involving surgery or ingestion).
Neurotechnology can extend beyond hospitals, clinical settings and traditional research facilities into multiple industrial and consumer fields-making this an explosive business opportunity, if done with the highest standards and regard for the ultimate consumer. Neurotechnology is a groundbreaking industry, currently transforming medicine, health, business, entertainment, athletic training and elite performance of all types, as well as people’s homes. What is missing in this explosion of brain health innovation is a gold- standard, community-based laboratory, to validate solutions, through clinical trials, and test markets across the lifespan, on a large scale.
Community collaboration
Through community collaboration, the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator also aims to reach out of the lab on the CORE campus in Lakewood Ranch to the greater Suncoast region, bringing innovation to the where individuals live, work, learn, and play. Community collaboration efforts will be scaled and replicated for brain healthy communities.
For example, by partnering with schools throughout the Suncoast Region, the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator will aim to cultivate brain healthy schools – schools that explicitly operate with brain health and performance in mind. Bringing brain health innovations and brain science-based best practice, curriculum, and programming to schools can help to address brain health and performance educational challenges, such as readiness to learn, school engagement, learning for understanding, learning differences, school start time, school nutrition, sleep issues, behavior, depression, anxiety, addictions, and childhood obesity.
Collaborating with companies allows the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator to transport and test brain health innovations to and within workspaces. Brain healthy companies powered by the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator can support the cultivation of healthier and happier employees and workspaces, which naturally extends after work to home life. A proactive approach to increase employee brain health and overall wellbeing outcomes through brain healthy lifestyle innovations related to physical activity and fitness, sleep, stress resilience and nutrition can impact all aspects of a business and organization. We expect an increase in employee engagement, creativity and productivity and a reduction in burden of cost related to chronic illness, including mental wellness concerns. A company that promotes brain health and performance optimization can also contribute to the company’s bottom line, productivity, cost-savings, and culture, which can have a “trickle-up” effect to the larger society.
The same community reach, through the Brain Health Innovation Accelerator, can be made with wellness and fitness centers, retirement communities, assisted living facilities, grocery stores, restaurants, parks and recreation centers, adult learning programs, and other areas of operation. We aim to focus deliberately on creatively combining expertise, lateral thinking, paradigm disruption, and amplifying trust and shared understanding among lab participants.
It is our goal to create the space for these groundbreaking discoveries worldwide, enabling members of brain healthy communities to be the first to benefit from the brain health innovations tested in the BHI’s Brain Health Innovation Accelerator.