The BRAIN Initiative is marking a milestone—10 years of advancing neuroscience and neurotechnology research by funding innovative projects. As part of a rotating series of blog posts, the directors of the BRAIN Initiative-partnering Institutes and Centers share their voice and perspectives on the impact BRAIN has made on their respective missions—and vice versa.
By Bruce J. Tromberg, Ph.D., Director, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering
How does NIBIB’s mission align with the NIH BRAIN Initiative?
NIBIB’s mission is to transform, through technology development, our understanding of disease and its prevention, detection, diagnosis, and treatment. It is synergistic with the BRAIN Initiative mission—to accelerate the development of innovative neurotechnologies and revolutionize our understanding of the human brain. NIBIB is a key technology development hub at NIH, and for the past decade we have collaborated with the BRAIN Initiative to support development of technologies enabling breakthrough discoveries about the human brain’s structure and function. Our extramural program staff have led BRAIN Initiative planning, implementation, and oversight of numerous BRAIN programs and activities. As a result, new scanners, methodologies, and approaches have dramatically improved existing imaging capabilities.
The BRAIN Initiative emerged in April 2013 from a U.S. Presidential directive to move neuroscience into a new era of identifying and tracking neural networks. To achieve that goal, NIBIB launched and led the Foundations of Non-Invasive Functional Human Brain Imaging program: Bridging Scales and Modalities. This program has supported the development of various non-invasive neuroimaging tools. These include a high-field MRI scanner that improves spatial resolution by an order of magnitude, a dedicated brain PET scanner that is 10-fold more sensitive than current machines, and a wearable high-density functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) system to measure brain function in real-time during natural behaviors.
How has NIBIB participated in the NIH BRAIN Initiative?
NIBIB’s scientific and programmatic expertise as part of the BRAIN Initiative early on was instrumental in the launch of next-generation human brain imaging modalities, as well as for stimulating the development of theories, mechanistic models, and analytical tools to understand brain circuits at various scales from cells to whole organisms. A long-time supporter of team science and model-driven experimental design, NIBIB has facilitated culture change in neuroscience: a lasting legacy of the BRAIN Initiative.
NIBIB and the BRAIN Initiative also share a commitment to training and workforce development, demonstrated by NIBIB’s support of all BRAIN training and career development activities, including participation and applications from individuals from underrepresented and minority groups. In particular, the BRAIN’s Pathway to Independence program has supported promising research scientists toward launching successful careers. Both NIBIB-supported scientists part of this program are women, and one has made the transition to tenure track and received her first NIH R01 grant: a major milestone for career independence.
What major BRAIN-funded scientific advancements or conversations has NIBIB been a part of?
NIBIB researchers are a multidisciplinary community with experience in team-based problem solving. NIBIB was an early advocate in BRAIN’s-support of the multidisciplinary nature of the BRAIN investigative teams, particularly by recruiting investigators from physical sciences and engineering to work alongside biologists, neuroscientists, and clinical and behavioral scientists. NIBIB is a committed advocate of the value of diverse expertise, facilitating strong academic-industry partnerships.
In one noteworthy example of a collaboration between Yale University, the University of California, Davis, and United Imaging Healthcare of America, NIBIB grantees with BRAIN Initiative support developed the NeuroEXPLORER scanner to produce high-resolution PET images of the human brain with exceptional sensitivity. As such, scientists can make direct measurements of brain nuclei never before possible. Although still currently a research tool, its developers anticipate that the technology will become available for clinical use.
Why do you think it’s important for NIBIB to participate in the NIH BRAIN Initiative?
Both NIBIB and the BRAIN Initiative are committed to developing and sharing innovative technology, leveraging activities and sharing lessons learned. Developing disease-agnostic tools to interact with, and better understand, the nervous system will have wide-ranging (and as-yet unpredictable) impacts across the biomedical research spectrum. Dramatic improvements in MRI provide a clear example: initially developed to visualize soft tissue contrast in the body, MRI technology has rapidly evolved as a powerful tool to measure brain activity (fMRI), and to map white matter structure in the brain (diffusion MRI/tractography).
How has the BRAIN Initiative advanced or shaped your mission?
The BRAIN Initiative has supported the NIBIB mission by supercharging investments in neurotechnologies. The Initiative has also shown that scientific culture change is possible, providing partners, like us, an important avenue for pushing hard to accomplish tasks through technology innovation.
In a fundamental way, the BRAIN Initiative has galvanized the neuroimaging and neurotechnology communities. We look forward to more game-changing advances that will revolutionize our understanding of the human brain—the vision of the BRAIN Initiative.