Al Fin: tDCS Kit and OTS Machines: Learn More Faster Be Awesome?

Kooky Video via Technology Review

It sounds like quackery, but it's not. A growing body of evidence suggests that passing a small electric current through your head can have a profound effect on the way your brain works. Called transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), the technique has already been shown to boost verbal and motor skills and to improve learning and memory in healthy people - making fully-functioning brains work even better. It is also showing promise as a therapy to cure migraine and speed recovery after a stroke, and may extract more from the withering brains of people with dementia. Some researchers think the technique will eventually yield a commercial device that healthy people could use to boost their brain function at the flick of a switch. _biotele.com

The article excerpted above was published in 2006, but it seems that the increasingly popular activity of home brain-boosting via tDCS is just getting started -- perhaps due to the feature film "Limitless" having stimulated the public imagination regarding the possibility of becoming smarter than you are?

Regardless, tDCS appears to have an undeniable effect, and if it can prove itself in the marketplace, we may see the beginning of "a smart revolution."

A $99 tDCS kit, the GoFlow Beta1, is due on the market. It will compete with tDCS machines that range in cost from $350 up to €3000 (about $4,000US). Do it yourself tDCS hacks can be made for anywhere between $30 down to the cost of a 9V battery, a couple of wires, and two saline soaked gauze pads. Of course, the cheapest devices are not necessarily the safest or most reliable.

Basic tDCS Schematic
Some of the uses to which tDCS therapy is being put:

- NEUROLOGICAL DISEASES:

Chronic pain (Fregni et al., 2006; Fregni et al., 2006; Antal et al., 2010)
Stroke (Fregni et al., 2005; Monti et al., 2008; Shlaug et al, 2008; Lindenberg et al., 2010; Williams et al., 2010)
Movement disorders:

- Parkinson disease (Fregni et al., 2006; Benninger et al., 2010)

- Tourette syndrome (Mrakic-Sposta et al., 2008)

- Dystonia (Quartarone et al., 2006)

Epilepsia (Liebetanz et al., 2006)
Alzheimer disease (Ferrucci et al., 2008; Boggio et al., 2008)

- NEUROPSYCHIATRIC DISORDERS:

Depression (Fregni et al., 2008; Rigonatti et al., 2008; Brunoni et al., 2010)
Craving:
-Alcohol (Boggio et al., 2008)

-Food (Fregni et al., 2008)

-Smoking craving (Fregni et al., 2008) _Newronika