NIH presents scientific outline of BRAIN Initiative
An outline of the science resulting from the $4.5 billion funding earmarked by a recent federal report for the Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative was released today by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The long-term scope of BRAIN was laid out by NIH Director Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD. “How the brain works and gives rise to our mental and intellectual lives will be the most exciting and challenging area of science in the 21st century,” said Collins in an official statement. “As a result of this concerted effort, new technologies will be invented, new industries spawned, and new treatments and even cures discovered for devastating disorders and diseases of the brain and nervous system.”
The outline was designed by a BRAIN working group and details how the $4.5 billion will be committed over the course of the next decade beginning fiscal year 2016. NIH previously announced $40 million in funding in 2014 and the Obama administration is making a subsequent request for $100 million in the 2015 fiscal year budget.
In addition to mapping the circuitry of the brain, a program that has been well publicized, research will also be measuring electrochemical activity. Seven key goals are being presented in the outline.
- Identify and provide experimental access to the different brain cell types to determine their roles in health and disease.
- Generate circuit diagrams that vary in resolution from synapses to the whole brain.
- Produce a dynamic picture of the functioning brain by developing and applying improved methods for large-scale monitoring of neural activity.
- Link brain activity to behavior with precise interventional tools that change neural circuit dynamics.
- Produce conceptual foundations for understanding the biological basis of mental processes through development of new theoretical and data analysis tools.
- Develop innovative technologies to understand the human brain and treat its disorders; create and support integrated brain research networks.
- Integrate new technological and conceptual approaches produced in the other goals to discover how dynamic patterns of neural activity are transformed into cognition, emotion, perception, and action in health and disease.
In order to meet these goals, researchers will be put to work pursuing both human and preclinical models, fully interdisciplinary collaboration, integrating disparate data, figuring out how to manage the resulting big data and bringing new technologies to the fore while continuing discussions concerning ethics and accountability.
The outline clears $400 million a year for fiscal years 2016-2020 with a major push toward technology. An additional $500 million a year is expected for years 2020-2025 slated more for application and integration of research and technology.
“While these estimates are provisional and subject to congressional appropriations, they represent a realistic estimate of what will be required for this moon shot initiative,” added Collins. “As the Human Genome Project did with precision medicine, the BRAIN Initiative promises to transform the way we prevent and treat devastating brain diseases and disorders while also spurring economic development.”