Brain disorders, such as anxiety and depression, are a leading cause of disability worldwide, yet standard therapies, including medication and psychotherapy, fail a significant proportion of patients. Maryam Shanechi, Dean's Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science, and Biomedical Engineering, and the inaugural holder of the Alexander A. Sawchuk Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, is working to address this major societal challenge through the development of brain-computer interface systems as potentially transformative therapies for these disorders.
Shanechi founded the USC Center for Neurotechnology to bring together engineers, computer scientists, neuroscientists, and clinicians to develop novel AI and computing algorithms that decode a patient's mental state, such as mood, from brain activity and use this decoding to precisely tailor therapies to the patient's needs. The Center also focuses on developing algorithms to regulate abnormal brain activity patterns with different treatment modalities like deep brain stimulation.
Since its founding in 2023, the USC Center for Neurotechnology has been boosted by several grants, including a recent $5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health's BRAIN, Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies, Initiative. The goal of this grant is to develop novel multimodal AI and sensing technologies for personalizing treatments in mental health conditions, addressing the challenges of inter- and intra-subject variability in symptoms, therapy response, and the complex brain activity patterns from which they emerge.
Led by Shanechi, the interdisciplinary team will collect brain signals, physiological signals such as heart rate or cortisol levels, and behavioral signals from patients. They will then develop multimodal AI algorithms that decode mental states by fusing all these signals, discovering multimodal neural-physiological-behavioral biomarkers for mental states. The team includes a collaboration between faculty from the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and the Keck School of Medicine across several departments, including Neurosurgery, Psychiatry, Computer Science, and Electrical and Computer Engineering. The team also includes faculty from the University of Washington who will study the neuroethics of developing neurotechnologies to address the concerns of patients and people with lived experience.
Shanechi emphasizes the importance of a truly interdisciplinary approach in addressing the immense complexity of the brain and transforming therapies for its conditions, including neurological and mental disorders. The USC Center for Neurotechnology aims to facilitate this approach, bringing together experts from various fields to work towards a common goal.
The development of AI-based neurotechnologies has the potential to revolutionize the treatment of brain disorders, offering personalized therapies that can adapt to the specific needs of each patient. However, realizing these technologies is a substantial challenge that requires collaboration and innovation across multiple disciplines. The USC Center for Neurotechnology, with the support of the NIH BRAIN Initiative grant, is well-positioned to make significant strides in this field, potentially improving the lives of countless individuals suffering from mental health conditions.
As the Center continues its work, the interdisciplinary team will focus on developing robust and reliable multimodal AI algorithms that can accurately decode mental states from complex brain, physiological, and behavioral signals. The success of this project could pave the way for new, personalized treatment approaches that address the unique challenges of mental health conditions and improve patient outcomes.
