Lucen develops a non-invasive neural interface that reads brain intent through focused ultrasound from outside the skull, enabling prosthetic control, communication, and device operation for people with paralysis or ALS. The technology aims to restore natural movement and speech without the risks associated with surgical implants.
Funding
Funding not disclosed
Founders
Product
Problem
People with conditions such as ALS, spinal cord injury, or locked-in syndrome lose the ability to move, speak, and interact with their environment, despite retaining the mental intent to do so. Current assistive technologies rely on residual muscle signals or invasive brain implants, which are slow, limited, or require risky surgery.
Solution
Lucen uses focused ultrasound to read neural intent from outside the skull, enabling hands-free control of prosthetics, communication devices, and wheelchairs without surgery. The system decodes a user's intended movement or speech directly from brain activity, translating it into real-time action in assistive devices. By eliminating the need for implanted electrodes, Lucen aims to make high-performance neural interfaces accessible to a broader patient population. The technology is designed to support immediate assistive use now, with a roadmap toward direct speech decoding and general-purpose interfaces.
Target Audience
Primary users are individuals with ALS, spinal cord injury, locked-in syndrome, or other conditions that impair movement and speech, along with clinicians and researchers in neurorehabilitation and assistive technology.
Features
- Non-invasive focused ultrasound technology that reads neural signals through the intact skull without surgical implantation
- Intent-based decoding for movement, enabling prosthetic limbs and robotic arms to respond to intended actions rather than residual muscle signals
- Communication support for non-verbal users, with selection-based input initially and direct speech decoding planned for future versions
- Assistive control for wheelchairs, smart home devices, and other equipment through thought-based commands
- Scalable research applications, including long-term monitoring of recovery and neural data collection at a scale invasive methods cannot achieve
- A phased development roadmap spanning prosthetics, daily device control, research tools, and eventual closed-loop therapeutic systems