IC Colloquium - The Human Brain Project
Event details
| Date | 09.12.2013 |
| Hour | 16:15 › 17:30 |
| Speaker | Henry Markram - EPFL |
| Location | |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
Abstract:
Understanding the human brain is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our time. Such an under- standing will lead to fundamentally new computing technologies, transform the diagnosis and treatment of brain diseases, and provide profound insights into our humanity. Today, for the first time, exponential improvements in the capabilities of modern ICT open up new opportunities to investigate the complexity of the brain. The goal of the Human Brain Project (HBP) is thus to build an integrated ICT infrastructure enabling a global collaborative effort to address this grand challenge, and ultimately to emulate the computational capabilities of the brain. The infrastructure will consist of a tightly linked network of six ICT platforms, which, like current large-scale physics facilities, will operate as a resource both for core HBP research and for external projects, chosen by competitive call. The HBP will drive innovation in ICT, creating new technologies for i) interactive supercomputing, visualisation and big data analytics; ii) federated analysis of globally distributed data; iii) simulation of the brain and other complex systems; iv) objective classification of disease; v) scalable and configurable neuromorphic computing systems, based on the brain’s principles of computation and cognition and its architectures. Expected outputs include simulations of the brain that reveal the chains of events leading from genes to cognition; simulations of diseases and the effects of drugs; early diagnoses and personalised treatments; and a computing paradigm that overcomes bottlenecks in power, reliability and programmability, captures the brain’s cognitive capabilities, and goes beyond Moore’s Law. Overall, the HBP will help to reach a unified understanding of the brain, reduce the economic and social burden of brain disease, and empower the European pharmaceutical and computing industries to lead world markets with enormous potential for growth.
Biography:
Henry Markram is a professor of neuroscience at the Swiss Federal Institute for Technology (EPFL). He is the founder of the Brain Mind Institute, founder and director of the Blue Brain Project, and the coordinator of the Human Brain Project, one of two ten-year one billion Euro Flagship Projects selected in January 2013 by the European Commission. After earning his PhD at the Weizmann Institute of Science, with distinction, he was a Fulbright scholar at the National Institutes of Health, and a Minerva Fellow at the Max-Planck Institute for Medical Research. In 1995 he returned to the Weizmann Institute, becoming an Associate Professor in 2000. In 2002 he became a full professor at EPFL. Markram’s research has focused on synaptic plasticity and the microcircuitry of the neocortex, in which he has discovered fundamental principles governing synaptic plasticity and the structural and functional organization of neural microcircuitry. Other key discoveries include the concept of Liquid Computing and the Intense World Theory of Autism. In 2005 he launched the Blue Brain Project to develop a data integration strategy for neuroscience. Markram has published more than one hundred papers and has one of the highest citation records in his area of research and stage of career. Since 2002, he has spearheaded Switzerland’s ambition to become a world leader in high performance computing and to prioritize simulation-based research; these fields are now two of the three national research priorities declared by the Swiss government. Markram is also co-founder of Frontiers (frontiersin.org), a new model for peer-reviewed open-access publishing.
Understanding the human brain is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our time. Such an under- standing will lead to fundamentally new computing technologies, transform the diagnosis and treatment of brain diseases, and provide profound insights into our humanity. Today, for the first time, exponential improvements in the capabilities of modern ICT open up new opportunities to investigate the complexity of the brain. The goal of the Human Brain Project (HBP) is thus to build an integrated ICT infrastructure enabling a global collaborative effort to address this grand challenge, and ultimately to emulate the computational capabilities of the brain. The infrastructure will consist of a tightly linked network of six ICT platforms, which, like current large-scale physics facilities, will operate as a resource both for core HBP research and for external projects, chosen by competitive call. The HBP will drive innovation in ICT, creating new technologies for i) interactive supercomputing, visualisation and big data analytics; ii) federated analysis of globally distributed data; iii) simulation of the brain and other complex systems; iv) objective classification of disease; v) scalable and configurable neuromorphic computing systems, based on the brain’s principles of computation and cognition and its architectures. Expected outputs include simulations of the brain that reveal the chains of events leading from genes to cognition; simulations of diseases and the effects of drugs; early diagnoses and personalised treatments; and a computing paradigm that overcomes bottlenecks in power, reliability and programmability, captures the brain’s cognitive capabilities, and goes beyond Moore’s Law. Overall, the HBP will help to reach a unified understanding of the brain, reduce the economic and social burden of brain disease, and empower the European pharmaceutical and computing industries to lead world markets with enormous potential for growth.
Biography:
Henry Markram is a professor of neuroscience at the Swiss Federal Institute for Technology (EPFL). He is the founder of the Brain Mind Institute, founder and director of the Blue Brain Project, and the coordinator of the Human Brain Project, one of two ten-year one billion Euro Flagship Projects selected in January 2013 by the European Commission. After earning his PhD at the Weizmann Institute of Science, with distinction, he was a Fulbright scholar at the National Institutes of Health, and a Minerva Fellow at the Max-Planck Institute for Medical Research. In 1995 he returned to the Weizmann Institute, becoming an Associate Professor in 2000. In 2002 he became a full professor at EPFL. Markram’s research has focused on synaptic plasticity and the microcircuitry of the neocortex, in which he has discovered fundamental principles governing synaptic plasticity and the structural and functional organization of neural microcircuitry. Other key discoveries include the concept of Liquid Computing and the Intense World Theory of Autism. In 2005 he launched the Blue Brain Project to develop a data integration strategy for neuroscience. Markram has published more than one hundred papers and has one of the highest citation records in his area of research and stage of career. Since 2002, he has spearheaded Switzerland’s ambition to become a world leader in high performance computing and to prioritize simulation-based research; these fields are now two of the three national research priorities declared by the Swiss government. Markram is also co-founder of Frontiers (frontiersin.org), a new model for peer-reviewed open-access publishing.
Links
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free
- This event is internal
Organizer
- Anastasia Ailamaki