As you fall asleep, halfway between
consciousness and unconsciousness, a
window of opportunity opens for hacking
your own dreams.
In this special period during the onset of
sleep, called hypnagogia, simple stimuli like the
movement of a car or the crackling of a campfire
can change what you dream about. Our tool, the
Dormio, helps you track this halfway period of
semi-consciousness and then plays sounds to
you at the specific moment when auditory
stimuli are likely to redirect your dreams as you
slip into sleep.
Historically, luminaries like Thomas Edison,
Tesla, Poe, and Dalí each accessed this state of
mind to capture creative ideas generated in their
sleep onset dreams. Our own research suggests
dreaming about a creative problem can improve
your waking performance on it. And a recent
neuroscience paper showed that people who
access this hypnagogic sleep are able to triple
their number of creative sparks when solving
math puzzles.
It’s exciting to think there are parts of our
minds that we typically can’t see, as they’re
hidden by sleep, and that we can use sleep
tracking tools to uncover our own hidden
creativity. If you decide to do this project it
will have some tough spots, debugging, and
improvising, but you will learn lots about sensors,
sleep, and hopefully yourself.
WHAT: The Dormio V3 is the newest in a series
of wearable devices we’re making which help you
track certain stages of your sleep and stimulate
yourself with sound or smell to change your
dreams in real time. We will make it together in
this tutorial!
The Dormio V3 is a hand-worn device that
tracks changes in three biosignals: heart rate,
skin conductance (electrodermal activity or EDA),
and finger muscle flexion. Changes in these
signals indicate the onset of sleep, when there
is a window of opportunity to play audio that will
influence your dreams. Dormio broadcasts these
three changing signals via Bluetooth to a web
interface which detects sleep onset and plays
audio during this special window of opportunity.
It uses an nRF52832 Bluetooth microcontroller,
TIME REQUIRED:
A Weekend
DIFFICULTY:
Moderate
COST:
$125–$180
MATERIALS
» Dormio V3 printed circuit board $14 each
from oshpark.com/shared_projects/YbsplJeh,
or make your own PCB from the files at github.
com/tomasero/openSleep, it’s open hardware.
» Electrical components, surface mount
The Fast Purchase list at Digi-Key (digikey.
com/short/2ztm1m1m) includes: nRF52832
Bluetooth LE microcontroller, voltage regulator
IC, battery charge controller IC, slide switch,
2.5mm stereo jacks (3), tactile switches (3),
micro-USB connector, resistors, capacitors,
inductor, crystal oscillator, and LEDs.
» Heart rate sensor $25 from pulsesensor.com
» Flex sensor Adafruit 1070
» EEG electrodes Amazon B06X1CL4S6
» FTDI breakout board, 3.3V SparkFun DEV-09873
» JTAG/SWD debugger Segger J-Link EDU Mini,
Adafruit 3571
» SWD cable breakout board Adafruit 2743
» Tag-Connect 6-pin “Plug-of-Nails”
programming cable, “no legs” version
TC2030-IDC-NL, tag-connect.com
» 2.5mm stereo plugs with bare leads (2-pack)
Amazon B07ZT15JVM
» Electrode lead wires with 3.5mm snap,
2.5mm plug Amazon B07F5PXVWB
» Electrical tape or heat-shrink tubing
» LiPo battery, 100mAh or bigger
TOOLS
» Soldering iron and solder, fine tip
» Magnifier
» Flux dispensing pen
» Wire strippers
» Computer with USB ports to program your
Dormio. Download the project code at github.
com/tomasero/openSleep.
so we can use Adafruit’s Bluefruit Feather BLE
ecosystem to program it.
WHY: For decades it was accepted scientific fact
that while we sleep our brains are turned off
and we’re not processing sight, sound, or smell.
Instead, new evidence suggests our brain is not
turned off in sleep at all — in fact many parts
are more active than when we’re awake, as they
work to process memories from the day, restore
cognitive function by clearing the brain’s cellular
waste products, and prepare for the next day by
simulating possible future scenarios. We are
Oscar Roselló
57
make.co
M81_056-63_DormioDreams_F1.indd 57M81_056-63_DormioDreams_F1.indd 57 4/12/22 11:29 AM4/12/22 11:29 AM
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