Hearing Your Heart

Our bodies are truly remarkable, with intricate mechanisms and functions that produce vibrations at low frequencies. These vibrations are an inherent and vital aspect of how our bodies function. Consider the multitude of ways these vibrations are generated: the rhythmic pulsations created by each heartbeat, the propulsion of blood through our veins and arteries, the swift movements of our muscles, and even our own physical motions. These vibrations travel through our bones, muscles, and arteries, forming a complex network of pathways that lead to our ear canals.

Within our ear canals, something fascinating happens. The walls of the ear canal begin to move, resembling the diaphragm of a speaker. These tiny movements generate sound, just like a speaker generates sound waves. It's incredible to think that our ears function as natural speakers, dissipating the beats and rhythms of our bodies into the surrounding environment.

However, have you ever wondered why we can't hear these internal sounds, including our own bodily vibrations or those of others? The answer lies in our limited hearing range, which is optimized by evolution to pick up sounds starting from approximately 20 Hz and above. This deliberate restriction ensures that our brains are not overwhelmed by a cacophony of internal sounds, allowing us to focus on processing the external sounds that fall within the audible frequency range.

Interestingly, there are certain animals, such as elephants and whales, that possess the remarkable ability to perceive and communicate using infrasound, which is sound below the range of human hearing. It's quite possible that these creatures can hear the vibrations produced by our bodies, making us audible to them in ways that we ourselves cannot perceive.

The intricate dance of vibrations within our bodies, the fascinating transformation within our ear canals, and the limitations of our hearing range all come together to create a marvelously intricate symphony of sound and perception. It reminds us of the vastness and diversity of the auditory world, both within us and beyond.

But this is where the MindMics story just begins. Despite the fact that, as humans, we cannot hear infrasound, MindMics has revolutionized the way we perceive and utilize sound through the ingenious utilization of microphones within everyday earbuds that many of us use for listening to music, taking calls, or blocking out surrounding noise.

At first glance, it may seem like a simple concept. However, don't let that deceive you. The challenge lies in the fact that our ears can only detect frequencies down to 20 Hz, which coincidentally is precisely where the symphony of the human body begins. In response to this limitation, industry standards have typically focused on measuring earbud components and microphones starting from 20 Hz.

But that's not the only hurdle. For frequencies as low as a few Hertz, the length of a sound wave in the air is roughly 100 meters!

Despite these daunting obstacles, the MindMics team led by Dr. Anna Barnacka, with a background in tackling the unsolvable, like capturing gamma rays originating in far-flung black holes traversing billions of light years across the universe, remains undeterred.

We have constructed state-of-the-art laboratories to establish standards for measurement and fine-tuning the performance of our system in the infrasound range. We are focused on delivering the next generation of health monitoring technology, clinically validated in world-leading centers. The MindMics team thrives on tackling challenges that others consider insurmountable, pushing the boundaries of what is possible in order to enhance our understanding of our own bodies and unlock new frontiers in healthcare and enable our health monitoring capabilities today!

The MindMics journey is one of audacious determination, combining expertise from diverse fields to create a groundbreaking system capable of capturing and interpreting the symphony of our bodies in ways never before imagined. We bring together a passion for innovation and a relentless pursuit of knowledge to forge a path toward a future where our own internal vibrations can be harnessed to optimize our health and well-being in a way as easy as listening to music through a pair of your favorite earbuds.