BRAIN 2025
The Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative is part of a new Presidential focus aimed at revolutionizing our understanding of the human brain. By accelerating the development and application of innovative technologies, researchers will be able to produce a revolutionary new dynamic picture of the brain that, for the first time, shows how individual cells and complex neural circuits interact in both time and space. Long desired by researchers seeking new ways to treat, cure, and even prevent brain disorders, this picture will fill major gaps in our current knowledge and provide unprecedented opportunities for exploring exactly how the brain enables the human body to record, process, utilize, store, and retrieve vast quantities of information, all at the speed of thought.
The Advisory Committee to the NIH Director BRAIN Working Group issued its plan for BRAIN in June 2014. Titled BRAIN 2025, the plan recommends annual investments ramping up to $400 million during the first six years of the initiative, and increasing to an annual $500 million during the following six years. William Newsome, who studies visual perception at Stanford University, co-chaired the 15-member BRAIN Working Group. The group also included three other leading vision scientists: Peter MacLeish (Morehouse School of Medicine); Richard Normann (University of Utah); and Joshua Sanes (Harvard University).
The NIH committed $40 million in Fiscal Year 2014 and will be a major partner for the duration of the initiative. Other government partners include the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF). Private sector partners include the Allen Institute for Brain Science, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Kavli Foundation, and the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.
First Brain Initiative Grant Awards
