Meet Alumni:

Amaira Srivastava

2025 3M Young Scientist Challenge Finalist
2026 Alumni Grant Recipient

Amaira was awarded the New Idea to Improve the World Grant for her work on “REWIRE,” a neuroadaptive reading platform that uses real-time brainwave feedback to improve attention, focus, and memory through subtle, noninvasive interventions.

About their Project

I built REWIRE as a web interface using Python, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. While a user reads digital text on the platform, the system continuously collects brainwave data using a noninvasive EEG device. It focuses on four brainwave types that are strongly connected to attention levels: theta, alpha, beta, and gamma waves. Research shows that increases in slower waves like theta and alpha are associated with reduced attention, while higher levels of beta and gamma waves are linked to active concentration. Using these signals, REWIRE calculates a focus score, which compares high-frequency waves associated with focus to slower waves associated with distraction. When the system detects that the focus score is beginning to decline, it triggers small visual or audio cues directly within the reading interface. These interventions are subtle and designed to bring the reader’s attention back without interrupting the reading process. Because this process happens automatically and in real time, the system adapts continuously to the reader’s cognitive state.

To evaluate whether REWIRE actually improves focus, I conducted a behavioral study with 49 student participants divided into two groups: a test group that used the REWIRE interface with real-time interventions and a control group that read the same material without those interventions. Each participant completed five reading sessions, resulting in 245 total sessions of data.

Across the sessions, participants using REWIRE consistently showed improvements in their focus scores compared to the control group. Using a Pearson regression test, I was also able to conclude that outside lifestyle factors like sleep, course rigor, exercise, and caffeine intake had little effect on the results, proving it was REWIRE that made the difference. These increases in attention were also reflected in better memory and quiz scores over time.

What was the inspiration behind your project?

My project, REWIRE, was inspired by the constant digital overstimulation that surrounds students today. I became interested in how dopamine-driven reward loops from short-form content and nonstop notifications can weaken attention span, focus, and the ability to stay engaged while learning. As I researched the issue more, I realized this decline in attention can have a major impact on education, especially on reading comprehension and sustained learning. That inspired me to create a way to help train the brain to refocus and strengthen attention in a healthier way.