NIH Director Francis Collins and President Barack Obama announcing the BRAIN initiativeWIKIMEDIA, CHUCK KENNEDYPresident Barack Obama yesterday (April 2) officially announced plans for a large-scale, government-backed research project to map the human brain, starting with an initial $100 million in federal funds for the development of new technologies that will enable the investigation of how millions of individual brain cells interact, reported BBC News.
Known as Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN), the initiative is designed to have the same transformative effect on brain research—and on our understanding of various brain diseases—as the Human Genome Project did for genetics research. It will begin next year, led by three government agencies: the National Institutes of Health (NIH), The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) and the National Science Foundation (NSF). A working group at the NIH—headed by Cornelia Bargmann of The Rockefeller University and William Newsome of Stanford University—will devise a plan of action, specific goals, and estimates of specific future budgets, reported The New York Times.
Private institutions, including the Allen Institute for Brain Science, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Kavli Foundation, and the Salk Institute for ...
