Boston-based Akili Interactive Labs developing therapeutic video games to enhance your cognitive functions

By Scott Kirsner, Globe Columnist

It's a pretty counter-intuitive concept, but what if playing video games could actually help improve conditions like depression or ADHD? A low-profile Boston start-up called Akili Interactive Labs is developing its own games to try to prove that hypothesis, and the company will conduct its first "before-and-after" brain imaging studies on players this spring.

Akili is being incubated at PureTech Ventures, a Back Bay firm that seeds new life sciences start-ups, and its acting chief executive is PureTech founder Daphne Zohar. But Akili is pretty different from the typical PureTech project: the start-up has brought on board veterans of Lucas Digital Arts and Electronic Arts who have worked on games like "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed" and "Medal of Honor."

"This is a whole new way of delivering therapeutic benefit in the field of cognition," says Zohar. "What if a child with ADHD symptoms, instead of taking Ritalin, could play a game?" She says the company will likely focus on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder first, with plans to study how games might affect other conditions, including stress, depression, and anxiety.

Akili has been working first on games for iPhones and iPads, and testing them so far with about 50 healthy individuals, "to hone both the science and usability," Zohar says. The company is in the process of "setting up collaborations to run pilot tests in multiple patient indications with leading academic investigators," she adds.