Cyborgnest: redefining human senses

Nature provided humans with an extensive set of sensory modalities, allowing our brain to constantly gather sundry inputs from the outer world. These sensory inputs help us understand the world surrounding us, forming the foundation of reality as we perceive it. But in a world where humans increasingly merge with technology, and the frontiers between the physical and the digital world are blurring, time has come to rethink the concepts of reality. Today’s artefacts already allow us to see and feel beyond our five recognized senses – sight, touch, taste, smell and sound. Yet, envision a world where wearable technologies enable us to explore a world beyond them, one in which we transcend the barriers of our natural body.

The idea that technology will determine our evolutionary future is by no means new. During our evolution, we have distinguished ourselves from other species, and fellow humanoids by our inventive, and intensive use of technology and artefacts – think of microscopes and MRI scans that shaped our awareness of the unseen, giving us the ability to understand micro-organisms and viruses. Humans have been co-evolving with the technology they produce. However, until now we mostly relied on external tools that serve our existing senses.

Sensory enhancement is a term that illustrates the use of technology to extend the body’s ability to sense aspects of the environment that are not normally perceivable by the human body in its natural state.

Cyborgnest, a UK based company strives to develop new sensory enhancing technologies, which could empower us to design our own evolution. Sensory enhancement is a term that illustrates the use of technology to extend the body’s ability to sense aspects of the environment that are not normally perceivable by the human body in its natural state. This can take various forms such as enhancing our existing senses or adding new senses through corporeal enhancement. Since everything we ever felt, thought or created started from a sensory input, it makes sense to pave the way for such devices, that extend our sensory capabilities, and provides us with new methods to understand and experience the world.

New kinds of sensory inputs will enhance our brain with new abilities to experience reality. 

Liviu Babitz, Cyborgnest CEO & Co-founder

The Sentero wristband is the first commercially available product from Cyborgnest. The wearable wristband is a sensory enhancement device which builds upon our most emotive sense – touch – to connect us to the planet and each other. The device can be programmed to vibrate when facing to a certain location or ‘nest’. This can be anywhere on earth that has location co-ordinates – such as a wearer’s home, or even other Sentero wearers. Using the connected smartphone app, wearers can program the patterned vibrations for each ‘nest’, send haptic emoji’s or even share their heartbeat with their loved ones. Sentero is a way to enhance our perception of space, create emotive directional communication, and forge new memories based on the newly acquired senses of orientation and spatial navigation.

Cyborgnest thinking is funded in the works of artists such as Neil Harbisson and Moon Ribas, some of the first humans creating their own organs. Which allows them to feel the world in novel ways and extend their physical capabilities. Ultimately, the goal of such technologies is to connect our biological self with technology, but also (re)connect with ourselves and nature.