The next decade of brain science will shape the human experience

The brain is the next great frontier — where humanity’s most intimate vulnerabilities meet some of our most powerful technologies.

At the heart of BrainMind’s mission is a simple question: Which ideas in brain science should scale if our only goal were human flourishing?

Since 2018, BrainMind has curated a community of more than 5,000 leaders across neuroscience, technology, venture capital, and philanthropy to identify and support high-impact ideas that often fall outside traditional funding models. We call this gap the BrainMind valley of death — where promising, ethically urgent innovations struggle to scale because they are not venture-backable.

From the beginning, we recognized that advancing this work responsibly would require more than funding. It would require shared norms. Over the past seven years, BrainMind has convened salons, advisory groups, and international collaborations — including work with UNESCO and the OECD — to build a foundation for ethical neuro-innovation.

Now, with Asilomar for the Brain and Mind (2026), we take the next step: moving neuroethics from principles to practice.

Rather than drafting another charter, the meeting will co-create practical tools — model policies for brain data governance, ethical integration frameworks for R&D teams, collaboration guides, and regulatory engagement templates — resources designed to be used immediately by entrepreneurs, funders, policymakers, and researchers alike.

This is not only a conversation. It is the beginning of a shared infrastructure for safeguarding mental privacy, agency, and identity in the age of neurotechnology.

Learn more about Asilomar for the Brain and Mind and our past efforts below.

ASILOMAR FOR THE BRAIN AND MIND

March 29 – April 1, 2026

BrainMind will convene a sector-defining summit dedicated to the responsible development, distribution, and use of near-term innovations in brain science.

Regulation will never keep pace with technological progress. Responsible innovation therefore depends on culture: the everyday decisions made by the people building and deploying the technology.

Asilomar brings together, in one working forum, the full set of stakeholders who determine how neurotechnology reaches society: builders, funders, clinicians, policymakers, researchers, and end-users. Rather than a traditional conference audience, the meeting functions as a coordinated decision-making body capable of carrying outcomes back into real-world institutions.

FROM PRINCIPLES TO PRACTICE

Neuroethics principles already exist. International bodies, including the US BRAIN Initiative, OECD, IEEE, and Global Neuroethics Summit, have articulated shared values: protect agency, preserve mental privacy, prevent misuse, and promote equity.

The challenge is implementation.

The people translating discoveries into products and clinical tools often lack operational guidance for applying these principles in daily decisions. Asilomar addresses this gap by producing usable methods that integrate ethics throughout the innovation lifecycle.

CO-CREATING IMPLEMENTATION

Asilomar is a workshop-driven working session. Participants are assigned to collaborative groups that develop, test, and refine practical governance tools across the innovation lifecycle.

Rather than panels or presentations, attendees actively build and pressure-test resources through real-world scenarios — the same kinds of decisions they face in companies, investment committees, clinical settings, and public institutions.

Workstreams include:

• A trust and transparency rating system for neurotechnology companies (NeuroTrust Index)

• Investor diligence standards and duty frameworks

• Operational toolkits for neuro-entrepreneurs navigating licensing and partnerships

• Lived-experience engagement frameworks for product and research teams

• Neural data use policies and internal governance procedures

• Industry-wide safety and accountability scorecards

• Board-level ethics and reputation risk oversight matrices

Each group leaves with refined tools prepared for public release and adoption across the ecosystem.

[Explore the workshops →]

PRIVATE SECTOR ENGAGEMENT

Commercialization of brain technologies will influence daily life at unprecedented scale, and much of this progress occurs in privately funded environments operating ahead of formal oversight.

Responsible outcomes therefore depend on shared norms among those making real-time development and deployment decisions.

BrainMind’s 5,000-member ecosystem uniquely enables this coordination. The network includes leading scientists, founders, investors, philanthropists, and public leaders whose professional decisions directly shape how technologies reach society.

When these groups convene, the result is not only discussion but alignment: the conditions required for culture change rather than isolated guidance.

THE “PACING PROBLEM”

Neurotechnology advances through convergence with AI, computation, engineering, and materials science. Innovation moves faster than policy can respond.

Many of the most consequential choices therefore occur before regulatory frameworks exist. Ongoing engagement among scientific, clinical, commercial, and societal leaders is essential, not to slow progress, but to meaningfully guide it as it unfolds.

ASILOMAR AND TOOLS FOR ETHICAL ALIGNMENT

At the 1975 Asilomar Conference on recombinant DNA, researchers established norms that shaped an entire field. The lasting impact came not primarily from regulation, but from shared expectations of responsible practice.

Brain science now stands at a similar inflection point.

The field possesses high-level principles but lacks widely adopted operational standards across sectors. Asilomar for the Brain and Mind aims to translate ethical ideals into shared tools that can be used during active development, investment, and deployment.

The goal is a durable culture of stewardship in neuro-innovation.

MOMENTUM TOWARD ASILOMAR

Asilomar builds on seven years of ecosystem development and collaboration.

BrainMind has worked with leadership from the OECD, UNESCO, IEEE, the BRAIN Initiative Alliance, the Neurorights Foundation, and international brain initiatives, alongside hundreds of advisors across entrepreneurship, investing, academia, philanthropy, and policy.

Multistakeholder workshops, public town halls, and private investor salons held in Boston, New York, Paris, and San Francisco have already produced multiple tools now being refined for deployment. At Asilomar, several working groups will run live simulations demonstrating how these tools function in real decision-making scenarios.

Participants understand the meeting is not speculative. It is an exercise in stewardship: establishing shared norms, shared guardrails, and shared responsibility for how brain technologies enter society.

Asilomar Preparation and Planning

BrainMind has been hosting a series of targeted gatherings, both small and large, over the past five years to foster consensus in preparation for Asilomar. Learn more about the pre-gathering below by clicking on the picture:

Past Gathering Highlights