CyberEurope

Abstract

In this feature, we will try to describe the characteristics of current cyberpsychology research in Europe. In particular, CyberEurope aims at describing the leading research groups and projects running on the other side of the Ocean.

FET Flagship—The Human Brain Project

Future and Emerging Technology (FET) Flagships are ambitious, large-scale, science-driven research initiatives (http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/ict/programme/fet/flagship/) that aim to achieve a visionary goal. To provide lasting support at a level that allows a concerted effort toward fulfilling a grand ambition, FET Flagships are envisioned to run for at least 10 years, with a budget of up to 100 M€ per year, per initiative. The scientific advance should provide a strong and broad basis for future technological innovation and economic exploitation in a variety of areas, as well as novel benefits for society.

To prepare the launch of the FET Flagships, six Pilot Actions were funded over a period of 12 months starting in May 2011 whose contents will be discussed in this and in the next issues.

HBP-PS: The Human Brain Project—Preparatory Study

For more info:

Prof. Henry Markram

EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne), CH

www.humanbrainproject.eu/

With some 50 to 100 billion neurons, the complexity of our brain continues largely to baffle the research community, which is now turning to the power of ICT as the key to progress.

Understanding the way the human brain works could be key to enabling a whole range of brain related or inspired developments in ICT, as well as having transformational implications for neuroscience and medicine.

The long term goal of the Human Brain Project is to build the informatics, modeling, and supercomputing technologies that are needed to simulate and understand the human brain. Biologically detailed simulations of the brain will make it possible, for the first time, to identify the multilevel chain of interactions leading from genes to cognition and behavior.

Also to be researched, using supercomputer-based simulation technology, are new diagnostic tools and treatments for brain disease, new interfaces to the brain, new types of low energy technologies with brain like intelligence, and a new generation of brain enabled robots.

What can Europe expect to gain?

The human brain has capabilities unmatched by current computing systems. It is a very fast, massively parallel, distributed machine with negligible energy consumption (just 20–30 watts). It is resilient to damage; it can categorize patterns in rapidly varying noisy data; it can learn and adapt; it can predict the consequences of its own behavior and that of other intelligent agents; it can think, express itself in language, and understand or learn the language of others.