# A Digital Therapeutic for Pain Relief through AI-Guided Visual Stimulation

> **NIH NIH R43** · DANDELION SCIENCE CORP · 2022 · $55,000

## Abstract

Project Summary
Dandelion™ was founded in 2020 to develop digital therapeutics for neurologic and psychiatric disorders by
interacting with the brain via the eyes. The goal of this SBIR is to design and test a safe, effective, and
nonaddictive pain-relief digital therapeutic in the form of visual stimuli. The platform will use artificial
intelligence (AI) and real-time biofeedback to “read” (decipher) brain signals and “write” to (neuromodulate) the
brain with rapid-changing visual stimuli composed of optimized patterns, colors, and frequencies. This is the
first attempt to use AI-guided visual stimuli as a treatment for pain. In 2017, 11 million of the 191 million
prescriptions written for opioid pain medications were misused, and 35% of opioid-related deaths (nearly
17,000 cases) were connected to these prescriptions. In the search for safe, effective alternatives, a range of
opioid-sparing interventions have been developed through pharmacologic, clinical, and digitized behavioral
platforms but none has proved fully successful. Dandelion hypothesizes that the complexity and variability of
pain demands a therapeutic approach that mimics the way the brain itself processes and integrates data for
pain perception. Through its novel neuromodulatory platform, using artificial intelligence to parameterize
potentially useful visual information, Dandelion will develop a safe, low-cost digital therapeutic that patients can
view on a smartphone or tablet for immediate pain relief. By correlating stimulus with response across different
types of pain, Dandelion also hopes to build a pain-perception map of wider applicability. In Phase I a
prototype AI-guided platform will be developed that can synthesize novel stimulation combinations and
optimize them based on feedback from an array of biosensors; their efficacy in reducing the perception of
induced pain will then be tested in healthy subjects. In Phase II, Dandelion will develop the prototype into a
commercially available product and test the pain-relief digital therapeutic for efficacy and generalizability in
randomized controlled trials. The commercial opportunity is estimated to be $5.9 billion.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10561374
- **Project number:** 3R43DA054845-01S1
- **Recipient organization:** DANDELION SCIENCE CORP
- **Principal Investigator:** Adam Hanina
- **Activity code:** R43 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $55,000
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2021-09-01 → 2023-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10561374

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10561374, A Digital Therapeutic for Pain Relief through AI-Guided Visual Stimulation (3R43DA054845-01S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-26 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10561374. Licensed CC0.

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