The NIH BRAIN Initiative has revolutionized neuroscience since 2014, when we funded our first set of research projects. Only 10 years later, we now have a trove of new knowledge about cells and circuits, hundreds of open source neurotechnologies, and a new culture that embraces the power and creativity of team science. As I wrote about a few months ago, each of the 10 NIH Institute and Center (IC) Directors who participate in BRAIN has contributed a blog post as part of our yearlong “BRAIN at 10” series that began this past spring. As the year comes to a close, let us revisit these perspectives about the broad value of BRAIN.
When I answer the often-asked question, “Why BRAIN?” I first remind people that one in three individuals worldwide is living with a brain disorder. With few exceptions, current strategies mostly treat symptoms because we do not understand the brain well enough to develop actual cures. Precise brain maps developed through the BRAIN Initiative are changing this by helping scientists redefine brain disease and injury at the cellular and circuit levels. Additionally, we are accelerating fundamental research that is helping to unravel the mysteries of the human brain, arguably the most challenging problem facing current and future generations of scientists. BRAIN is advancing neuroscience research in many ways, as noted by my NIH IC Director colleagues in their blog posts.
One brain, many disorders
For example, BRAIN Initiative researchers have identified the master regulator of opioid reward — a brain region central to emotional regulation, reward, and motivation among people who take opioids. This work was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)’s Single Cell Opioid Response in the Context of HIV (SCORCH) program. As described by NIDA Director Dr. Nora Volkow, new BRAIN tools and technologies are helping to explain brain mechanisms behind the effects of drugs, as well as suggesting ways to target those processes to heal the brain.
Along with several ICs, NIDA also supports the recently launched Brain Behavior Quantification and Synchronization Program (BBQS), which aims to understand in fine detail the dynamic back-and-forth communication that goes on between the brain and its surroundings. Numerous brain-related conditions affect behavior, but we do not yet know the cause-and-effect relationships behind these interactions to figure out how to interrupt them when needed.
Window to the world
Many brain conditions affect how we connect to the world around us, compromising vision, hearing, balance, taste, smell, voice, speech, and language. National Eye Institute Director Dr. Michael Chiang reminded us that the eye and visual system create an outstanding model system for developing and testing new tools and methods. That is because the retina — an extension of the brain — is much more accessible than other parts of the brain. Various vision-related BRAIN projects have helped explain the components and processes that help us think, move, and experience the world around us. Indeed, vision science and neuroscience continue to move each other forward, noted Dr. Chiang.
New BRAIN Initiative-developed atlases and technologies offer a powerful lens to map and eventually modulate sensory processes that underlie brain injury or disease, stated Dr. Debara Tucci, Director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders. For example, researchers have learned that neural prosthetic devices implanted between the inner ear and the brain may substantially improve hearing compared to a cochlear implant. BRAIN-funded researchers are also transforming what we know about taste and smell. A 3D-imaging technique, Swept Confocally-Aligned Planar Excitation (SCAPE) microscopy is helping us understand odor-receptor interactions in mammalian brains. Dr. Helene Langevin, Director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, described BRAIN Initiative efforts underway to understand the complex process of interoception: how an organism senses, interprets, integrates, and regulates signals from within itself. This research is illuminating brain-body relationships integral to designing whole health therapeutic strategies.
Transforming technology for new discovery
The BRAIN Initiative’s intentional focus on accelerating neuroscience through novel technology development is giving scientists new ways to look inside a living brain. As described by Dr. Bruce Tromberg, Director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, new non-invasive neuroimaging tools include a high-field magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner that improves spatial resolution by an order of magnitude, a dedicated brain positron emission tomography (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. These tools create exciting new opportunities for discovery that can improve our understanding of the brain in ways we cannot predict, as part of the tool-driven revolution BRAIN has inspired.
When the BRAIN Initiative began, we set our sights very high: “to get a dynamic picture of the brain in action and to better understand how we think … how we learn … and how we remember.” Through an intentional strategy of open, ethical, and inclusive science, we have a lot to show after 10 years. BRAIN has had a very exciting and productive decade of innovation, reaching new levels of progress not imaginable when we started. In 2024, BRAIN remains committed to its core values as we build on what we have learned since 2014 to shape a rapidly changing scientific landscape and neuroscience ecosystem.
I wish you and your families a peaceful, joyous, and healthy holiday season.
With respect and gratitude,
John Ngai, Ph.D.
Director, NIH BRAIN Initiative