The Brains@Play Initiative is an international research collective enabling the responsible design and development of brain-responsive multiplayer experiences through the production of public design workshops, educational resources, and open-source software tools.
An international design fiction competition seeking creative ideas for brain-responsive multiplayer games.
An online entertainment event combining neuroscience, neuroethics, and interactive media for participatory technology design.
Marientina Gotsis has a broad background in arts, design and engineering with a special interest in interactive entertainment applications for health, happiness and rehabilitation. She founded and leads USC's Games for Health Initiative since 2007, connecting health professionals with innovation in various forms of interactive media. She is co-founder and director of the Creative Media & Behavioral Health Center, an organized research unit between the School of Cinematic Arts and the Keck School of Medicine, which was established in 2010. This center designs, develops and evaluates entertainment applications at the intersection of behavioral science, medicine and public health.
Dong Song is a Research Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Co-Director of the Center for Neural Engineering at the University of Southern California (USC). His research interests include nonlinear dynamical modeling of the nervous system, hippocampal memory prosthesis, neural interface technologies, and development of novel modeling strategies incorporating both statistical and mechanistic modeling methods.
Dimitris Grammenos is a Principal Researcher at the Institute of Computer Science (ICS) of the Foundation for Research and Technology - Hellas (FORTH) specializing in Human-Computer Interaction. Parallel to his research work, he develops and delivers workshops and events that introduce the concepts and practice of creative thinking and creativity to people of all ages and backgrounds. Up to now, he has run more than 60 workshops in 5 countries with a total of about 4000 participants.
Garrett Flynn is a neurotechnologist in the Computational Neuroscience (BS) and Media Arts, Games, and Health (MA) programs. Informed by his experiences at the Neural Modeling and Interface Lab under the guidance of Dr. Dong Song, his work empowers the participatory, human-centered design of next-generation brain devices.
Samir Ghosh is a coder and polymath who serves as Assistant Director for the Ahmanson Lab at USC. Over there, they manage a makerspace, teach workshops, and produce impactful VR, AR, and hardware projects with professors and students from many fields. Some of these projects have received contributions from organizations such as the Vatican, the California Science Center, and the LA Times.