Neuvana’s flagship product, Xen, will be part of a $4 million research grant awarded to The University of Notre Dame, which was awarded the 2022 National Health Institute Director’s Transformative Research Award. Neuvana, a South Florida-based neurotech company, developed its product Xen to target the vagus nerve through electrical stimulation to help regulate the body’s nervous system. This process involves specially patented earbuds powered through a smartphone app. When the vagus nerve is stimulated, the body naturally releases neurotransmitters that help induce a calmer state, making regulating daily stressors more manageable.
“The work Notre Dame is doing to help adolescents is so important and we are proud to play a small part in their mission to help lower the staggering suicide rates among teens in our country,” Ami Brannon says, CEO of Neuvana. “We invented this product to help people of all ages feel good and thus live a better life without relying solely on prescription drugs. It is moving to see how science and technology can aid in this truly transformative work to help save lives.”
The research project titled “Leveraging Noninvasive Transcutaneous Vagus Nerve Stimulation and Smartphone Technology to Reduce Suicidal Behaviors and Suicide Among Highly Vulnerable Adolescents” will focus on using Xen to study how adolescents learn to regulate emotions by tapping into the body’s vagus nerve system. The study is part of Notre Dame’s ongoing SPIRIT program (Suicide Prevention Initiative—Research, Intervention, & Training), which aims to reduce the burden of self-harm and suicide on individuals, families and communities. The program recruits undergraduate and graduate students interested in researching the risk and prevention of suicide attempts and suicide among children, adolescents and adults.
For more information about the project, visit Preventsuicide.nd.edu.
