BRAIN Initiative Challenges Researchers to Unlock Mysteries of Human Mind
April 02, 2013
10:15 AM EST
Today at the White House, President Obama unveiled the “BRAIN” Initiative—a
bold new research effort to revolutionize our understanding of the
human mind and uncover new ways to treat, prevent, and cure brain
disorders like Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia, autism, epilepsy, and
traumatic brain injury.
The BRAIN Initiative — short for Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies — builds on the President’s State of the Union call for historic investments in research and development to fuel the innovation, job creation, and economic growth that together create a thriving middle class.
The Initiative promises to accelerate the
invention of new technologies that will help researchers produce
real-time pictures of complex neural circuits and visualize the
rapid-fire interactions of cells that occur at the speed of thought.
Such cutting-edge capabilities, applied to both simple and complex
systems, will open new doors to understanding how brain function is
linked to human behavior and learning, and the mechanisms of brain
disease.
President Barack Obama is introduced by Dr. Francis Collins,
Director, National Institutes of Health, at the BRAIN Initiative event
in the East Room of the White House, April 2, 2013.
(Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)
In his remarks this morning, the President highlighted the BRAIN Initiative as one of the Administration’s “Grand Challenges”
– ambitious but achievable goals that require advances in science and
technology to accomplish. The President called on companies, research
universities, foundations, and philanthropies to join with him in
identifying and pursuing additional Grand Challenges of the 21st
century—challenges that can create the jobs and industries of the future
while improving lives.
In addition to fueling invaluable advances that improve
lives, the pursuit of Grand Challenges can create the jobs and
industries of the future.
That’s what happened when the Nation took on the Grand Challenge of the Human Genome Project.
As a result of that daunting but focused endeavor, the cost of
sequencing a single human genome has declined from $100 million to
$7,000, opening the door to personalized medicine.
Like sequencing the human genome, President Obama’s BRAIN
Initiative provides an opportunity to rally innovative capacities in
every corner of the Nation and leverage the diverse skills, tools, and
resources from a variety of sectors to have a lasting positive impact on
lives, the economy, and our national security.
That’s why we’re so excited that critical partners from
within and outside government are already stepping up to the President’s
BRAIN Initiative Grand Challenge.
The BRAIN Initiative
is launching with approximately $100 million in funding for research
supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and the National Science
Foundation (NSF) in the President’s Fiscal Year 2014 budget.
Foundations and private research institutions are also
investing in the neuroscience that will advance the BRAIN Initiative.
The Allen Institute for Brain Science, for example, will spend at
least $60 million annually to support projects related to this
initiative. The Kavli Foundation plans to support BRAIN
Initiative-related activities with approximately $4 million dollars per
year over the next ten years. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute and
the Salk Institute for Biological Studies will also dedicate research
funding for projects that support the BRAIN Initiative.
This is just the beginning. We hope many more foundations,
Federal agencies, philanthropists, non-profits, companies, and others
will step up to the President’s call to action.
Dr. Francis Collins is Director of the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Arati Prabhakar is Director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
Follow new developments relating to the BRAIN
Initiative and other advances in science and technology at the White
House Office of Science and Technology Policy Blog and @whitehouseostp on Twitter.
Related Topics: Innovations
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