Decoding Brain Organisation and Dysfunction

Decoding Brain Organization and Dysfunction

At a glance | Challenges | Solutions | Contact | Research Groups

At a glance

Increasingly precise imaging techniques have helped catapult brain research into a new era in recent years. However, the topic “Decoding Brain Organization and Dysfunction” benefits above all from the close interdisciplinary cooperation between brain research and computing.

Jülich researchers are thus able to decode in enormous detail the organization of the brain, how the brain absorbs and processes information, and its plasticity. To do so, the scientists are developing, on the one hand, informative brain models and brain atlases and, on the other hand, advanced analysis methods for large and complex data sets using high-performance computers and artificial intelligence. This results in new diagnostic procedures, model-based therapeutic approaches, and new methods in the field of machine learning.

Challenges

The human brain is one of the most complex systems in the universe. When it fails – as is the case with dementia or after a stroke – it becomes apparent to us all just how central the brain is to our entire being. At the same time, brains differ from one another – they are variable. This is of great significance for medicine: the aim is to be able to recognise and distinguish between what is a change in the direction of a disease, so that something can be done about it early on, and what is perhaps just an individual peculiarity.

Science knows a great deal about neurons and their networks, which are crucial for our thinking and behaviour. However, the exact mechanisms for our lifelong ability to learn, the ability to remember, different ageing processes, individual differences in perception, and the causes of numerous diseases often remain a mystery.

Solutions

Jülich researchers decode the organization and function of the human brain, its high level of complexity, and its many changes over the course of a lifetime, including in the event of illness. To do so, the experts use innovative imaging and optical techniques as well as high-performance computing.

Basic neuroscientific research is complemented with methods from the fields of modelling and simulation as well as artificial intelligence. This enables the Jülich researchers to gain new insights from large and heterogeneous data. This work forms the basis for understanding information processing in the brain and opens up the possibility of developing brain-inspired technologies. The results of this research also help to better understand, diagnose, and treat neurological and psychiatric diseases.

One product of these efforts is the pioneering “Julich Brain Atlas” – the most detailed brain atlas in the world, currently containing maps of more than 200 regions. The atlas is able to link properties of the brain on the molecular level with the microstructure and function of the brain, allowing researchers to gain a deeper understanding. Based on the digital model “BigBrain”, which was developed at Jülich and in Canada with a resolution accuracy of 20 micrometres, a digital 1-micrometre brain is currently also being developed. This should make it possible to record all 86 billion neurons in the brain for the first time and to gain an even better understanding of neural networks.

These advances in brain research have been enabled by supercomputing and large-scale, multidisciplinary collaboration. Jülich experts played a leading role in the European Human Brain Project (HBP). The HBP has given rise to a digital platform – the European research infrastructure EBRAINS.

Key elements of EBRAINS include the extremely high-resolution Julich Brain Atlas and the supercomputing methods developed at Jülich specifically for neuroscientists, as well as concepts for brain-inspired neuromorphic computer architectures. The EBRAINS infrastructure is available to researchers from all over the world. Within the EBRAINS ecosystem, they will also find extensive data sets, analysis and simulation tools, and direct access to high-performance computers. This opens up unprecedented opportunities for brain research, medicine, and technology development.

And it is not only neuroscience that stands to benefit, as insights into the brain are also fed back into machine learning and artificial intelligence methods. AI algorithms developed in the Human Brain Project based on the model of the brain have already shown significant benefits, demonstrating high energy efficiency, flexibility, and plasticity, as well as the ability to learn from sparse data. Access to the enormous computing capacities of the first European exascale computer, JUPITER, at Forschungszentrum Jülich will also be important in future.