What Is the Brain Interface You ‘Snort’? Ray Kurzweil Joins Startup Using Nanoparticles

Ray Kurzweil, the pioneering AI scientist and longtime Google researcher, has joined Silicon Valley startup Subsense as a product and vision advisor as the company develops a brain-computer interface that could enter the brain without surgery.

Subsense announced Kurzweil’s involvement at an event at its Palo Alto headquarters on Wednesday, September 2, 2026, where the company also presented its early-stage technology that uses specially engineered nanoparticles delivered through the nose.

The unusual approach is designed to create a direct link between the brain and computers without drilling through the skull. Instead of implanting a chip into brain tissue, Subsense wants to send charged nanoparticles into the brain through the nasal passage and then control them with a wearable device. The technology is still being tested in preclinical studies and is years away from possible human use.

How does the ‘snorted’ brain interface work?

Subsense calls its technology NanoBCI, short for nanoparticle-based brain-computer interface. The basic idea is to use the nasal route to introduce specially engineered, charged nanoparticles into the brain.

Once inside, the particles would be controlled using a headset or cap fitted with magnetic coils. The system is intended to either stimulate neurons in selected areas of the brain or detect neural activity.

At its September 2 event, Subsense showed a nonfunctional mock-up of the proposed device. The company said it looked like a combination of a baseball cap and a bicycle helmet.

The approach is described as nonsurgical because it does not require opening the skull. However, that does not mean it is currently proven to be safe or minimally invasive. The technology remains experimental, and Subsense is still working on different parts of the system in laboratory and animal studies.

The company’s first medical targets include neurological conditions such as Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy.

Why is Ray Kurzweil joining subsense?

Kurzweil has spent decades predicting that advances in artificial intelligence, nanotechnology and neuroscience could eventually allow humans to interact with computers in far more direct ways.

Speaking at the Subsense event, Kurzweil explained why he sees brain-computer interfaces as an important step in that direction.

“Ultimately, we want to merge the smartphone with the brain,” Kurzweil said at the event, arguing that external devices such as smartphones can act as a barrier between people and the power of AI.

He added:

“The whole point of humans is to go to greater frontiers, expand who we are.”

In a separate statement about joining Subsense, Kurzweil said the startup’s work brings together several technologies he has long believed could transform how humans interact with machines.

“For years, I have believed that the convergence of AI, nanotechnology and neuroscience could fundamentally change how humans interact with technology,” Kurzweil said.

He described Subsense’s approach as having the potential to move brain-computer interfaces beyond today’s surgical limitations, while also stressing that broader applications remain a longer-term possibility.

Kurzweil will not be leading the company’s engineering work. His role is focused on the product roadmap and the longer-term vision for how AI and neural interfaces could change human-computer interaction.

Subsense CEO Tetiana Aleksandrova said Kurzweil’s involvement also reflects the company’s ambitions for the technology.

“I believe the brain-computer interface eventually may become one of the most intimate technologies that human beings ever created,” Aleksandrova said.

She also acknowledged that some of the ideas Kurzweil has explored throughout his career still belong to the future.

From treating brain disorders to putting AI in the brain

Subsense is not currently building a consumer device that people can simply use at home. The company is still in the preclinical stage, with experiments involving mice and other tests examining whether the underlying technology can work.

The startup has raised $27 million in funding so far and hopes to begin human clinical trials as soon as 2027. Any such trials would still need to follow the required regulatory and safety process.

If the technology eventually proves safe and effective, Subsense sees applications beyond medicine. The company has said its long-term goal is to develop a broader consumer technology that could allow people to interact with computing systems more directly.

That puts Subsense in the same rapidly expanding brain-computer interface field as companies such as Neuralink and Synchron, but its proposed route into the brain is markedly different.

Neuralink’s current system uses surgically implanted electrodes, while Subsense is betting on nanoparticles delivered through the nose and manipulated externally.

The key question now is whether the unusual approach can move from an intriguing laboratory concept to a technology that is safe, reliable, and effective in humans. For now, the “snorted” brain interface remains an experimental idea rather than a working consumer product.