What is Human Augmentation and How Does It Work?

Working for a deep tech venture fund is a thrilling experience. We have a broad interest in deep tech at Prime Movers Lab, and we cover some of the most fascinating aspects of the field, such as transportation, energy, infrastructure, manufacturing, agriculture, and human enhancement. I enjoy that space is included in transportation; I’m ready to go!

While other phrases like manufacturing or infrastructure are more evident, I often get a few puzzled eyes when I reveal our Human Augmentation concentration! What exactly do we mean when we say “human augmentation”?

Before I get into our exact goals, I did some research on the internet to see what others are saying. Surprisingly, many of the talks revolved around the same topic, which is wonderful to see in this environment. I saw a lot of talk about developing and growing human capabilities, which is what this field of labour and study is all about.

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Eyeglasses and telescopes were the “first” augmentations, and it’s only gotten better since then. Also, you know things are getting interesting when the world’s defence agencies start looking at it! (By the way, this document is up to date and a fantastic resource!)

That’s how I got into augmentation work in the first place. We worked on creating neurotechnologies to speed up learning or augment real-time warfighter performance during my tenure at DARPA. One programme was dubbed “Augmented Cognition,” and it aimed to alleviate cognitive stress on complex military tasks via a closed-loop neurotechnology intervention in real time.

As this smart graphic from a paper by the UK Ministry of Defence illustrates, most augmentation references tend to focus on either the physical or cognitive aspects.

“Human Augmentation – The Dawn of a New Paradigm,” by the UK MOD. May 20, 2021

However, our focus on longevity has captivated — but not totally contained — our interest in biological modification at Prime Movers Lab. The issue of longevity is too broad for this overview, but I recommend that you read my colleague Jyothi Devakumar’s outstanding blogs for a more in-depth look at this fascinating field of study.

To summarise, we are looking at three aspects of augmentation at Prime Movers Lab: physical, cognitive, and biological.

As I go over these topics, I’ll use particular instances from our portfolio to try to solidify these concepts. Of course, any cutting-edge deep tech firm worth its salt can’t always be neatly classified into a single category, so I’ll cover several areas that naturally overlap.

Physical Enhancement

Prosthetics and assistive devices are included in the definition of physical augmentation. That might include prosthetic limbs, such as those developed by our portfolio business Unlimited Tomorrow, which has devised a completely new and considerably more cost-effective method of providing upper-limb prosthesis to both children and adults. If you haven’t already, go to their website and read the stories (and grab a tissue first!). While assistive devices for the restoration of function have advanced tremendously (take a look at the seriously sci-fi limbs created by DARPA’s Revolutionizing Prosthetics programme), there is also talk of expanding function in able-bodied individuals, such as the University College London’s Third Thumb project. Their findings raise some intriguing issues concerning neuroplasticity, or the brain’s innate ability to adapt to new inputs and technologies (more on that in a moment). Exoskeletons, which have been designed for both restoration and enhancement and show amazing potential, are also included in physical augmentation. Wearable sensors are also having a big impact on augmentation, with the ability to measure as well as add/enhance sensory function. Our phones are a pervasive type of enhancement, and when technology like VR and AR go from handheld to head-worn, those physical augmentations will undoubtedly increase our cognitive realm. We at Prime Movers Lab are interested in where these deep tech fields meet in order to enrich and broaden the human experience.

Cognitive Enhancement

And then we rapidly move on to elements of overlap between these two domains! Paradromics, a company in our portfolio, is one such example. Paradromics is developing the next-generation invasive brain computer interface, which will include a low profile and high bandwidth device for decoding brain impulses directly into actions. Clearly, this is a cognitive augmentation, but one with important overlaps with the previously discussed physical augmentation area. Invasive brain computer interfaces will be utilised to control communication gadgets, physical limbs, wheelchairs, and likely a slew of other things we haven’t even thought of yet! Invasive and non-invasive brain computer interfaces are evident instances of cognitive augmentation that can be utilised for both repair and increase of function. Read our blogs (1,2) and attend our webinar here for a fascinating overview of brain computer interfaces. Through a closed-loop non-invasive neurotechnology system, Optios, an existing portfolio firm, is taking a non-invasive method to increasing performance, initially for golf.

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Neurostimulation devices, which employ electricity, magnets, or ultrasound to directly trigger changes in the brain, are also effective tools for cognitive enhancement. I’ve already discussed that topic here, and we’re really enthused about the possibilities of these technologies. So much so that we invested in Attune Neurosciences this year, a startup that uses non-invasive neurostimulation to control sleep and wakefulness. These approaches can be used to improve a variety of states, including sleep (which is quite important!). In a future webinar, we’ll spend more time on this topic, but the idea that vital functions in the body and brain can be controlled non-invasively and without medicines is fairly compelling. Both peripherally (for things like pain and bladder control) and centrally, invasive neurostimulation devices have shown remarkable potential (memory augmentation). This link leads to an excellent academic review of cognitive enhancement. It is undoubtedly one of the most thorough I have seen, and it serves as a good introduction to the wide range of neurotechnologies available in this field.

Biological Enhancement

Biological augmentation is the biggest category, but it’s also the one where we’re seeing the most rapid progress. There’s a lot of enhancing going on in biology, spurred up by the arrival of CRISPR-enabled gene editing, novel AI/ML methodologies starting to intersect with drug development, quick screening, and a whole number of other process improvements. And thank heavens for it, because we humans are in desperate need of assistance right now. Vaxxinity and Gilgamesh Pharmaceuticals are two portfolio firms that have overlap in both the biological and cognitive domains. While Vaxxinity’s immediate goal is to develop a COVID vaccine, it also wants to use synthetic peptide immunogens (connected to precision-engineered target antigens) to treat Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. A vaccination for neurodegenerative disorders could have a huge influence on human intellect and longevity. Similarly, in prior blogs (1,2) and our webinar, I discussed the developing psychedelics landscape. Gilgamesh Medications, one of our portfolio companies, is developing innovative pharmaceuticals inspired by psychedelics to treat the most serious mental health issues, including as treatment-resistant depression, opioid use disorder, and anxiety. These advancements are nothing short of revolutionary in terms of mental and cognitive wellness. This is what the future will look like! We will continue to focus on companies that can have a large influence on neurodegeneration, cognition, and mental health as part of this thrust.

We’ve also been fairly busy in our biological augmentation attempts for longevity. There’s a lot going on in this space, and there’s a lot to keep up of. I’ll highlight a few of our current investments here, and you can read more about them in my colleague Jyothi’s writings. In terms of enabling technologies, Gordian, one of our existing portfolio companies, has developed the first in vivo therapeutic screening platform to aid drug discovery for complicated ageing disorders. Its pooled strategy enables it to target some of the most difficult disorders, and the business validated its approach in an existing disease model, allowing it to expand its drug discovery efforts. One of our more recent investments in IVIVA Medical is directly tackling the dilemma of organ shortages and organ failure by developing unique synthetic organs that can be implanted in humans, which is at the convergence of physical and biological enhancement.