A Human Genome Project for the nervous system? BIOS Health raises fresh funding
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Author:
Mimi Billing
BIOS Health was founded by computer neuroscientist Emil Hewage and bioengineer Oliver Armitage in Cambridge in 2015, as a way to commercialise all the advancements in the field over the prior 20 years. It uses data-driven insights from the nervous system — which helps different parts of the body to communicate — to build neural digital therapies, the new trend in precision medicine.
Similar to Elon Musk’s Neuralink, BIOS Health developed an implant that connects with its platform to change the signals to the nervous system. When it took part in Y Combinator in 2017, BIOS could already integrate the brain implant into a pig.
But in the last couple of years, it's slowly moved away from the hardware part of its business and can now integrate its tech with other implant manufacturers. The company is instead focusing on building a new standard for mapping the neurological network.
By connecting to a sensor placed on or close to the body, it can read nerve impulse activity and tell millisecond by millisecond which cells are firing where and what messages they're sending.
The tech could be used to treat conditions like heart failure, arthritis, diabetes and Crohn’s disease, which occur when the signals between the brain and diseased organs are failing. In the case of heart failure, for example, BIOS would be able to intercept that signal and rewire the brain, dramatically improving the health and well-being of patients.