Eva Esteban: My Journey Into Neurotech
The world of neurotechnology is growing at an unprecedented rate. Among the emergence of new ventures, next-generation product launches, regulatory approvals, research breakthroughs and more, a new generation of voices have come into view.
One of those voices belongs to Eva Esteban — OpenBCI’s award-winning Embedded Software Engineer and co-founder of Unipeers, a non-profit supporting international STEM students. NeuroTechX Content Laboratory director Sophie Valentine sat down with Eva to discuss how she wound up in neurotech, her hopes for the future of the industry, and what advice she’d give her younger self.
Eva’s journey
Sophie Valentine: Can you give us an overview of your journey into neurotech?
Eva Esteban: My journey into neurotech began with a childhood belief that engineers can solve any problem, inspired by my father. He used to fix anything that broke around the house. To me it felt like magic. Anytime something broke for anyone in the family he would always be the one to fix it. I started helping him from an early age. There was this time — I think I was 10 or 12 — where his computer broke because one of the pieces was too old. I asked him if I could try to build a piece that was similar and he humored me and said yeah sure, I’ll show you how to use a soldering iron, and here’s a few metal scraps. I ended up replicating that piece and putting it into the computer and it worked. My dad left it in the computer and it worked for 20 years. It was a really simple moment but it made me realize that I had problem solving skills and I could get things done. From that moment on I started getting interested in math and engineering.
In 2015, I moved from Spain to the UK to read Electronic Engineering with Computer Systems at the University of Surrey. I got into robotics and joined the IEEE student branch, building my first robot and realizing the potential of technology to create innovative solutions. I was trying to figure out what kind of applications I wanted to use my skills for when I saw an article about a spinal implant for someone that had been paralyzed that could give them some of their movement back. That really resonated with me because I knew a couple people who’d had accidents — I was amazed at the power of the tech to give them something back. I became more interested in the healthcare space and ended up pursuing a year-long software engineering internship with GE Healthcare.
At GE I was doing research focussed on virtual reality (VR) app development for doctor training — things like teaching clinicians how to do certain cardiac procedures. I was also doing research in the dementia field, investigating different types of dementia and how to diagnose them earlier. At the same time, my grandma started getting Alzheimer’s and that motivated me to focus on trying to make life better for people like her, because by the time she was diagnosed she already had a lot of symptoms. I also became a certified STEM ambassador and volunteered at organizations such as GirlsGetSET and GE Volunteers to teach young children about the wonders of STEM.
“My journey into neurotech began with a childhood belief that engineers can solve any problem.”
I ended up presenting my research at the 2018 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC). GE had never sent an intern before so I had to make a case about why my research was important and why they needed to send me, as the first intern, to the US. That conference sparked my interest in brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) after I saw a poster where the researchers were trying to use EEG to diagnose Alzheimer’s in a non-invasive way. I started familiarizing myself more with BCIs, especially the non-invasive ones. But when I got back to the UK I was talking to my friends about BCIs and how they can be used to control things with the brain, and they were all like “This is Sci-Fi, this doesn’t really exist”. I didn’t really have any courses to take, so I decided to start working on side projects.
At the same time, I realized that in the US there was a lot more research going on around BCIs, so I took up a Master’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell Tech in New York City. On the side, I started working with two friends, Alana Crognale and Tomi Kalejaiye, on a prototype for a little wheel that you could rotate with concentration via BCI. The BCI cost $30 — that was the maximum I could afford — and we got it working. From that moment I was hooked, because I could see the potential that it had and how new it was. I started teaching myself because I really wanted to contribute to pushing the field forward. I ended up posting that project online, and I think it was Joe [Artuso] from OpenBCI who found it and reached out to me to see if I was interested in joining OpenBCI when I graduated. I already knew who OpenBCI was and had strong respect for their ethical development of their tech, so I already wanted to work with them — it was a mutual interest.
SV: What was the steepest part of your learning curve getting to where you are now?
EE: Finding the neurotech space. I always had an engineering-or-neuro dilemma because I didn’t know this space existed. Once I found it, I saw that there are not many companies and a lot of them are small. I needed to master multiple skills to be able to fill a large gap in the team. I was the first full-time engineer at OpenBCI, so I needed to work across the full tech stack. I also needed to do social media, customer support, webinars, and so on.
Moving to the UK for my undergraduate studies and to the US for my graduate studies, especially figuring out how to get scholarship funding, was also a steep learning curve. I co-founded Unipeers, a platform that provides support and guidance to international students seeking educational opportunities in the US, to help others through this process.
“I still have that same passion when I wake up in the morning and come into the office. And I think it has to do a lot with being surrounded by people that feel the same as me.”
SV: What advice would you give to yourself 10 years ago?
EE: Pursue your dreams without self-doubt! Don’t let fear of failure hold you back — take the leap even if success seems unlikely. You’ll surprise yourself with what you can achieve. The hardest part of my own journey has been believing in myself enough to aim for things that others told me were impossible. Nowadays, I train this persistence muscle by doing uncomfortable things daily.
Be selective with advice. Don’t blindly follow the opinions of those who haven’t achieved what you aspire to. Some people may discourage you out of love or envy. Seek guidance from those who have walked the path you want to walk.
Don’t let your work consume your identity. Your work doesn’t define you — your worth extends beyond your professional achievements. I’ve always been very career oriented and there was a time when I focused a lot of my time into work. It got to the point where I was starting to get a little bit burnt out because I was doing neuro during the days but I was doing neuro projects on the weekends. I was feeling a little bit like my whole self was just neuro. I decided to change that and started getting into other things, for example sports, which has helped me to have balance.
Cultivate meaningful connections through networking. Attend conferences, join professional organizations [editor’s note: like NeuroTechX!], and engage in community events to connect with like-minded individuals. You are the average of the 5 people you spend your time with. When I joined OpenBCI, I felt like I found my people because we all have the same goal — to push the field forward and help people. I still have that same passion when I wake up in the morning and come into the office, and I think it has to do a lot with being surrounded by people that feel the same as me.
SV: You mentioned finding your people at OpenBCI. Can you explain that further?
EE: OpenBCI’s mission is to democratize BCIs and make them accessible all over the world. One of the ways we do this is by making our products open source and by building a community to connect people in the field so they can learn from each other. We are ‘technology enablers’.
When I was deciding which BCI companies to apply to work at after graduating, OpenBCI stood out because of this mission, which I think is very pure. I figured that people who work there and believe in that mission must be of good nature, and I was right. Conor [Russomanno] is a very good-hearted, optimistic and empathetic person. I think his attitude trickles down in the company and creates a healthy culture where we all help each other to grow. Everyone at the company is passionate about pushing the boundaries of this field in a way that improves the world. Our TED project is a great example of this — and a powerful reminder of the impact our work can have on people’s lives, as well as the importance of pushing boundaries. I feel like everything that I’m doing is with good intentions and it’s the same for my colleagues.
The industry
SV: Now you’re working in the industry, how does reality live up to your expectations?
EE: I was actually a little bit scared of that — turning my hobby into what I’m going to do every day for eight hours a day or more. For me, it did live up to my expectations and a lot of that has to do with the environment at OpenBCI. It feels like I’m working with a group of people that are like me and have the same drive. Coming from the tech community, which is huge, it’s nice to find a ‘family-like’ industry. You see the same people at many events. Most people are supportive and help each other. It’s less intimidating than I’d thought.
But — dealing with the human body is complicated. It’s a complex environment with many unknown variables. I used to work with robots, which are predictable. Media portrayals of neurotech sometimes create unrealistic expectations by oversimplifying the complexities involved in understanding and interfacing with the human brain. And non-invasive EEG by itself is not as useful for the kind of applications I want to build as I thought. It’s much more usable when combined with other modalities (EMG, PPG, eye-tracking, and so on).
“Areas I’m keeping an eye on include personalized healthcare and well-being, cognitive enhancement and performance optimization, and assistive technologies and neurorehabilitation”
SV: Which neurotech developments are you most excited about at the moment?
EE: For non-invasive technologies: biosensing to track (and stimulation to treat) mental health conditions, like anxiety or depression, neurological conditions, such as tremors, and dementia. Alzheimer’s disease is a condition close to my heart — it runs in my family and it’s devastating. I’m also interested in ‘closing the loop’ to produce systems that can not only track a user’s biometrics, but also influence them. Our smart watches already keep track of our stress levels, energy, and so on. I see a future where we will use BCIs and extended reality (XR) technologies to be able to somewhat quantify emotional states. With these systems, we could potentially not only track these states, but also induce them.
For invasive technologies: restoration of movement and senses (sight, touch, and so on). I learnt about spinal implants helping paralyzed individuals for the first time right out of high school and it’s what motivated me to get into engineering for healthcare. Human augmentation — surpassing our current limitations — is also an exciting prospect. Our typing speed, for example, is limited by how fast we can move our fingers. With BCIs, we could bypass the hands and reach new limits.
Other areas I’m keeping an eye on include personalized healthcare and well-being (we can develop tailored interventions and therapies for various neurological conditions by leveraging individual brain patterns), cognitive enhancement and performance optimization (neurofeedback and brain stimulation can improve attention, memory, and learning, benefiting the education, sports, and professional fields) and assistive technologies and neurorehabilitation (BCIs and neuroprosthetics can support communication and mobility, restoring independence and enhancing quality of life).
SV: What do you think are the most underrated and overrated narratives in neurotech at the moment?
EE: A potentially underrated narrative is maybe the ethical considerations and potential risks associated with advancing neurotechnology. While there is a lot of excitement surrounding the potential benefits of neurotech, it is crucial to address the ethical implications and ensure responsible development and use.
OpenBCI has always held strong ethical views on how to develop these technologies. We are very careful about what we do with people’s data. Everyone we hire is on the same page about considering the ethics while you’re developing the technology. Not just developing the tech and seeing what’s going to happen, but trying to develop both at the same time so that when the tech is ready, we know what to do with it and we don’t have regrets later on. At OpenBCI, we all do tech support and customer support, so we experience people’s concerns. It’s helped me to realize that people are really not gonna adopt it if they don’t feel safe and comfortable with it. As an engineer, it’s easy to only focus on the product, but we must develop the guidelines and regulations alongside the technology.
With the recent controversy regarding AI tools like ChatGPT, this ethics narrative is gaining more traction — it feels like it’s really picked up in the last few months, especially with the release of Nita Farahany’s recent book, The Battle for Your Brain.
One theme that’s definitely overrated is the idea of mind reading or mind control through neurotechnology. Popular culture often portrays neurotech as a means to read people’s minds or control their thoughts, leading to exaggerated fears and misconceptions. While neurotechnology can interpret certain patterns of brain activity and enable communication with the external world, it is far from achieving mind reading or mind control capabilities as commonly imagined.
“People have too high expectations about what these devices can do, that they can really read your thoughts and know what you’re thinking. It’s really not that specific yet.”
Looking forward
SV: What do you see as the major challenges and opportunities in the neurotech sector at the moment?
EE: There are a lot of things that we still need to work on, especially if we want to bring this technology to consumers. One thing that always comes up for me when I speak to our users about what they need to run their BCI experiments is noise reduction. This can come from mechanical improvements, but also we are currently working on algorithms that can remove noise. Another one is comfort. Even though the devices that we are making today are much more comfortable than the ones that were used 20 or 30 years ago, there’s still a lot of work to do if we want to ask someone to wear this in their daily life — like how I wear glasses every day. Also: the style. People are not going to wear something that looks bad.
How to introduce this technology into society, that aspect of getting people’s expectations right, is also a challenge. The general public has watched movies about neurotech and movies that feature AI. Some of those movies have portrayed the tech working in a way that currently is not possible. Obviously Sci-Fi is a large genre, so that makes sense, but I think a lot of people have too high expectations about what these devices can do, that they can really read your thoughts and know what you’re thinking. It’s really not that specific yet — I don’t know if in the future it will get there. But I think for now it’s important to help people understand what the tech can and can’t do, for better or for worse, so that they’re not skeptical or holding extremely high expectations.
Finally, metrics need to be accurate and reliable in order for people to trust them. Quantifying human emotions reliably is an extremely hard problem that a lot of institutions are trying to solve, and we need to be creating metrics that are scientifically validated for states like feeling stressed. I think it’s important, especially for researchers, to really show how you are calculating these metrics. If you don’t know where it comes from, people are going to be very skeptical about using it.
SV: What do you think will be your personal biggest challenge in the next few years?
EE: Finding how to best contribute to this field. I’ve been specializing in Embedded Software for the last couple of years, but I have the constant dilemma of whether I should follow this vertical path or stay a generalist. I like learning new things, and working on different projects.
Learning itself is also a challenge — I have so much to learn! I entered this field only 3 years ago, and I make a constant effort to learn and then educate others about this technology. I’m very shy but am learning how to be out there so we can get more people interested in this tech and grow the field faster. Being a member of the Women in Engineering Society committee during my undergrad, particularly while seeking collaborations and organizing workshops for younger students, helped me to overcome my shyness and develop networking skills. That experience empowered me to step out of my comfort zone.
SV: How would you describe your experience as a woman in STEM? What challenges and opportunities can women in STEM face?
EE: Lonely but rewarding. Growing up, I didn’t have many women to look up to in the field of STEM, which made it challenging to envision myself pursuing a career in these disciplines. When I first went into engineering, my undergraduate class was around 80% male. I found myself doubting my abilities and questioning whether I belonged. Women often face unconscious biases and stereotypes which can manifest in the form of limited opportunities or lack of recognition. However, once I started accomplishing things I started getting more confident. Of course, this is still a work in progress for me.
A significant turning point in my journey was during my first internship at GE when I had the privilege of being mentored by a remarkable woman in the field — Christina Kalli. She was my first STEM role model. With her help, I learnt to advocate for myself and not let gender stereotypes hold me back. I learned that women often excel in areas such as collaboration, communication, empathy, and attention to detail — and that recognizing and leveraging these strengths can lead to more inclusive and effective team dynamics. We can also bring a unique perspective to a team; I am currently the only female in the engineering team at OpenBCI, which lets me introduce an alternative perspective to issues such as device comfort, the type of applications that we build, and more.
Over the years, I have observed a positive shift in the representation of women in STEM. The situation is much better than 10 years ago. We are breaking down stereotypes and inspiring the next generation, encouraging young girls to pursue their interests and potential in these fields. I hope to be the role model for little girls that I never had.
Edited by Sophie Valentine for NeuroTechX’s Content Laboratory.
Sophie Valentine has a background in experimental psychology and cognitive neuropsychology research, with degrees from Bristol University. Her work is focussed at the intersection of tech-for-good, product, digital health, and neurotechnology.
