We pair a non-invasive brain stimulation protocol with the reading or language instruction students are already doing — and the gains show up, specifically, in what matters most: decoding unfamiliar words, acquiring new vocabulary, and retention that holds after treatment ends.
The evidence
Three findings from the tES (transcranial electrical stimulation) literature, each directly load-bearing for the pilots we run.
A 2025 scoping review of every published tES clinical trial in developmental dyslexia found positive effects on reading in all eleven — with the strongest, most consistent signal on non-word decoding, the core skill at the center of the condition.
In both dyslexia and language learning, measurable effects hold up after stimulation stops — from one-week follow-ups in vocabulary studies to six-month follow-ups in reading interventions.
In a randomized five-day trial, adults who trained with tES learned up to 40% more novel vocabulary than an unstimulated control.
Our mission
Accelerate how the brain learns language — whether it's a child decoding their first words or an adult mastering their fifth.
Two programs
The science is shared. The protocols, partners, and outcomes are tuned to each audience.
For language schools
Deployed alongside your existing instruction, our tES (transcranial electrical stimulation) protocol helps students clear the score thresholds that change their lives.
See the language programFor dyslexia programs
Our protocol targets the phonological decoding deficit at the core of dyslexia — run as a short pilot inside the specialty schools, tutoring practices, and clinics already doing the hard work.
See the dyslexia programThe science, in plain English
Our devices deliver a small electrical current — roughly the strength of a hearing-aid battery — through two electrodes on the scalp. It isn't strong enough to fire neurons on its own. What it does is lower the threshold for firing: the region under the electrode becomes a little more responsive to whatever it's already trying to do.
Which is why the instruction matters more than the device. Pair the current with active practice — sounding out words, learning new vocabulary — and the circuits doing the real work encode the skill a little more efficiently each session. Stimulation on its own doesn't teach anyone anything.
Different jobs, different targets. For reading and phonics, we target several regions in the system that turns letters into sounds — the network a struggling reader leans on when they meet an unfamiliar word. For language learning, Broca's and Wernicke's areas — the brain's talker and its listener.
Dive into the research
Ten load-bearing studies from the tES (transcranial electrical stimulation) literature in reading and language acquisition.
A 2025 scoping review of the entire tES-for-developmental-dyslexia clinical literature (225 participants total). Strongest, most consistent signal on non-word decoding.
Eighteen sessions of tES paired with phoneme-grapheme training produced low-frequency word and pseudoword reading gains that persisted at six-month follow-up.
In a randomized five-day trial (n=40), adults trained with tES over left temporoparietal cortex learned up to 40% more novel vocabulary than sham controls.
tES over core left-hemisphere language areas facilitated novel word acquisition, with the largest gains for anodal stimulation of Broca's area.
![Forest-plot-style summary showing pooled effect g=0.50 with 95% CI [0.29, 0.71] across nine trials](http://generalneuro.com/cdn/shop/t/6/assets/fig-balboabandeira2021.png?v=57489989151778790871776881922)
A 2021 systematic review and meta-analysis of tES trials for second- and foreign-language learning in healthy adults: nine studies, 279 participants, moderate overall effect on learning (g=0.50, p=.0001). Biggest gains came when stimulation was applied during the learning phase — not during test.
A meta-analysis of 246 effect sizes from language and math tasks. Stimulation during the learning phase (d=0.712) was more than three times as effective as stimulation during testing (d=0.207) — evidence tES drives durable learning, not just an in-the-moment lift.
Eighteen sessions of tDCS paired with cognitive training reduced low-frequency word errors and non-word reading times in children and adolescents with dyslexia. Gains held at one-month follow-up.
Anodal tDCS over left superior temporal gyrus in dyslexic children improved auditory temporal processing, speech-in-noise perception, verbal memory, and reading — with reading improvements statistically tied to the underlying auditory gains.
A crossover trial in 24 children and adolescents with dyslexia: five consecutive daily tDCS sessions produced non-word reading speed gains sustained at one-month follow-up — evidence a short, deployable protocol is enough.
Expert consensus on safe output parameters for transcranial electrical stimulation in wellness, over-the-counter, and consumer applications — the standard our protocol sits inside.
Who's building this
General Neuroscience is an operating company, not a concept. We have institutional backing from SOSV, a tier-one manufacturing partner, and a first-gen device that's already been used in real-world settings at scale.
Backed by the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale — the university's flagship accelerator for early-stage ventures.
Our headsets are manufactured in partnership with HAX, the deep-tech hardware program operated by SOSV — the same program behind Formlabs, Opentrons, Flow Neuro, Neurode, Samphire Neuro, and dozens of other hardware companies.
We've already delivered tES (transcranial electrical stimulation) sessions to 200+ people. This is proven hardware with real deployment history — not a prototype on a bench.
The team
General Neuroscience is a team of seven. Everyone here is building the device, studying the science, or using the product themselves on a language they're actively learning.
Dr. Alec Sheffield
CEO & Chief Scientific Officer
Yale-trained neuroscientist (PhD, 2025). Expertise in non-invasive brain stimulation and electrophysiology.
Currently learningMandarin Chinese
Luke Knoble
Chief Technology Officer
Ex-Boeing, then to Penumbra building embedded software for stroke-rehabilitation devices. Leads development of the Neurolingo System.
Currently learningRussian
Dr. Joseph Knoble, M.D.
Chief Medical Advisor
Former Chief Fellow at Yale Psychiatry. Clinical safety advisor for the NeuroLingo System.
Currently learningLebanese Arabic
William Polsky
Chief Operations Officer
Mechanical engineer out of the New Haven startup community. Runs design, supply, and manufacturing.
Currently learningItalian
Zida Sung
Principal Electrical Engineer
Specialist in low-power circuit design. Owns the non-invasive brain stimulation circuitry.
Currently learningSpanish
Vanacharla Bhaskara
Software Engineering Intern
Master's in Data Science. Machine learning specialist.
Currently learningEsoteric English vocabulary
CZ Martin
Senior Software Engineer
Machine learning specialist and full stack engineer. Virginia Tech, 2019.
Currently learningVietnamese
Next step
A 30-minute call is enough to figure out whether your cohort, timeline, and outcomes are a fit. If they aren't, we'll tell you directly.
