It’s unnerving to enter the ever-questioning mind of neuroscientist Dr Tej Tadi. The World Economic Forum Global Young Leader 2015, Tadi and his company MindMaze proficiently read minds. Yes, you got that right. Yet, the enterprising San Francisco-based electronics engineer who pursued an advanced master in Virtual Reality and Computer Graphics at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Switzerland is anything but geeky.
Suave, clear-sighted and even musical, the years Tej spent huddled deep into research have only moulded a go-getting and thoughtful man. The intuitive man in his 30s is direct, honest and enroute to changing medicine for neuro rehab with state-of-the-art brain imaging technologies through his company MindMaze’s avatar-driven product MindMotionPro. This was what enabled his most recent high — a $1 billion shot in the arm with a less than third buyover by a Hinduja Group entity of MindMaze.
The device will aid patients with neuro disability and spinal chord injuries gain back movement, all with a brain, body and imaging interface. Yes, it’s mumbo jumbo to the non-scientific, but in effect Tej Tadi has learnt to trick the mind to activate neurons to go back to deciphering signals for nervous system injuries. For Tej, it’s a life’s passion,
Voice apprehensions about being able to “read minds” and he laughs, “We are not going to try and read the mental state or tap into it for anything that is not normally volitional. My vision is to accelerate the ability to learn and adapt to enhance, accelerate.”
The recipient of the Pfizer Award 2009 , Tej is most chuffed about the World Economic Forum Young Global Leader moniker, “It feels good as it’s more a responsibility than an accolade. You have to give back to society and have six years to make sure you’ve done the job,” smiles the neuro whiz.
The Hyderabad-born genius and Ted Ex speaker who studied at Little Flower Junior College and Kendriya Vidyalaya was deep in the throes of aerospace and fuels when VR decided to make him an avatar of change. Years later, Tej, the avatar, formulated his own avatars for medical leaps. If along the way, he has garnered sensational gaming expertise, and learnt business, then he is all the wiser.
Still unnerved, we explore Tej’s world of neuro networks that is helping bridge the neuro rehab conundrum. “A part of the Hindujas, the banking arm is behind this. A few years ago, we got to know the group while working on a common scientific project,” explains Tej. Tadi hopes to bring it to Indian hospitals and homes this year with a cheaper subscription model for single individuals, clinics and hospitals.
“Healthcare has always been a passion project, and the Hinduja Group’s access to leasing, manufacturing, distribution and customer service centres was a perfect fit,” Tadi adds, hoping to launch in 2016 in India, and further develop the automotive and defence specs by early 2017. A recent study has shown that,
“Typically, there is a 35 per cent faster recovery with MindMotionPro — Globally, neuro rehab has been neglected. The medical world has got to stop thinking of a physical rehab solution versus a neuro rehab cognitive one,” Tej explains. Tadi founded MindMaze in 2012. Ask the quick-thinking guy how MindMaze’s unicorn successes have changed him?
“It’s made Tej exponentially older! I am 75 in my head. The younger Tej was, I wouldn’t say naive, but more academic. You believe that next generation research is going to do a bit for humanity, but I realised that the hurdles to translate an idea (are huge), and you learn. You have to understand your vision to make a real dent,” he explains.
For him, cognitive psychology, neuro imaging and VR is where his brain kicks in. “I grew up in Hyderabad and my parents are physicians based out of Hyderabad, though they seasonally migrate. Though I chose engineering, I did my advanced masters in VR in 2004. It was exciting and I was working on things then that are still not out yet,” Tej reveals.
His parents have also inspired him to go beyond the ordinary, “My parents are happy about what I do, yet more than my growth, they are proud that it’s going to change lives. They are both in their 70s and still do a lot pro-bono clinical work. It’s probably the only profession (doctor) where one keeps helping,” he says.
An alpha tester for his gaming team, Tej says, “Gaming was more a business strategy. We wanted to get into gaming as we build our own hardware, and software and a lot of what’s available is sub par. We wanted our chips and expertise out in the market so we can then fund the medical business based on our gaming expertise,” he says, A heavy gamer back in the day, Tej loved strategy games but now it’s brain mapping and neuro rehab that’s on his mind.
With a clarity of purpose he says, “I have gotten into machine mode. When you create something, it’s almost a madness, right? I think nothing comes close, it’s something you get up for everyday.” At the epoch of so many ground breaking inventions, how does he handle the constant scrutiny? “Oh that’s simple, you have to walk into a hospital or go back and meet my team — you are immediately grounded,” smiles the guy with ambitions to have a MindMaze chip in all self driving cars, and enter defence and media specs too.
The robotics whiz is a closet film buff and spends his spare time creating short 3D films combining VR and real video. Not many know that Tej is an amateur composer too! If the future is about innovations, MindMaze and Tej are the helm of it all… mind reading right at the crux of it. For the right reasons, of course!
Brainstorms
The device
While understanding the device might need a through knowledge of robotics, Tadi explains, “The first application was for a stroke patient who had paralysis, a right brain injury. It’s not enough if someone is helping you move it physically 20 times. Let’s look at areas damaged, how quickly we can activate residual networks, so we can control functions, that’s the underlying principle.
To do that, you have to create the right environment to stimulate networks, right? So a part of what we have discovered is even though you don’t move your hand, when you see it move, it activates networks.
Funnily enough, lots of developmental studies have shown children verbalising, emulating parents. That is how we build our learning patterns. It’s okay if patients don’t move their paralysed limbs, but let’s get them to move the good side. They then put on a virtual reality goggles and visualise them moving their good side on a screen.
That’s where MindMaze steps in, the device puts these movements on to the bad unmoving side of the screen in a real time avatar. From the patient’s perspective, he is moving the good right hand but on the screen, he sees the left hand move on an avatar, and the residual networks in the brain are activated. It is still the patient’s intention to move, and uncannily enough, if we do this enough, they slowly begin to regain control of their paralysed limb — it’s quite remarkable,” he explains. MindMaze also has 3D virtual reality goggles, motion capture cameras, more as developer kits in the market
Learn from Tej
Truly understand yourself and what you want to achieve, it’s not just fun and cool to start a start-up. You can trick everyone except yourself.
Don’t be attached to ideas for too long. nUnderstand the practicalities of how a business might work, as it can be a fantastic idea, but if you cannot leverage resources, to get it to market in a time frame, it’s of no use.
Don’t hire friends for the sake of hiring, people are the most important thing.
You can listen th Dr Tadi @ http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/A-neurotechnology-startup-accel
http://www.tedxlausanne.com/fr/talk/getting-your-brain-game
