Blue Brain Project — The Start Towards Evolution Of Human Brain

Webdrills Academy
4 min readMar 17, 2021

Introduction:

The artificial brain is the software or hardware that functions in terms of the memory, thoughts, emotions, and preference of the biological human brain. The reverse engineering approaches of the human brain can be used to explain the workings of the brain.

The human brain function is also difficult for scientists to comprehend.

Blue Brain Project (BBP), a Swiss brain science project aimed at recreating an artificial brain by reverse engineering on brain circuits. The Blue Brain project was initially set up in May 2005 at the EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) Brain and Mind Institute in Switzerland.

It specializes in natural sciences and engineering. This project involves the various levels of the organization, the interaction, and compatibility of the brain with the available experimental data.

This aims at constructing detailed digital reconstructions (computer models). The project’s supercomputer-based re-constructions and simulations provide an entirely new approach to understanding the brain’s multilevel structure and function.

The Purpose behind it:

The main purpose behind the Artificial Brain is the link between man’s brain and the artificial brain. It is to allow machines to function as a human mind and to use supercomputers with massive storage facilities.

This can be used indefinitely to distinguish between the human brain and the artificial brain. If an individual dies, information and wisdom will become empty, the period of life of any person is reduced.

All the contents of the brain can be extracted using an artificial brain before the death of human beings and can be used indefinitely. In studies into the treatment of disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, the artificial brain can also be used.

The human brain is a complex multi-level system of 100 milliards neurons (brain cells) and 100 trillion synapses (biological channels for the exchange of signals). The links between the neurons form a hierarchy of circuits, ranging from local microcircuits to the entire brain level.

In the meantime, each neuron and each synapse at a lower level is itself a complex molecular machine. These experiences are the triggers of human behavior, human emotion, and human perception.

Project Blue Brain is led by EPFL Professor Henry Markram. The blue brain uses a supercomputer built by IBM named “Blue Gene’’ that runs software designed by Michael Hines and John Moore called “NEURON”.

It is a simulation environment that models the human brain’s neural network. It has been said that the project will be officially launched by 2023.

The reconstruction strategy of the BBP recognizes interdependencies in the experimental data and utilizes them to limit the phase of reconstruction. Multiple, intersecting constraints make it possible for the project to create the most faithful reconstructions from the minimal experimental data available, eliminating the need to quantify anything.

How does it work?

Using a tiny robot named ‘nanobots,’ the data is uploaded from the human brain to supercomputers. They are too small to be able to reach the spine and central nervous system.

After entering the brain, nanobots begin to scan and track the neuron structure. Communication between computers is created only by using nanobots as an interface.

The software used is referred to as “BBP-SDK,” a software development kit written in Java and Python wrapped in the C++ library. The BBP-SDK collects data from nanobots and uses a data visualization program named “RT Neuron” written in C++ to visualize the collected data.

This collected data was specifically designed for 3D neuron simulation visualization. The final data is stored in databases and can be used to further model the functions of the human brain.

If this experiment is successful, then it is possible to store and analyze brain information.

In reality, the BBP’s recent reconstruction of the connectivity of the cortical microcircuit is based on experimental data representing less than 1% of the circuit’s synaptic connections. Lab experiments that provide new data and constraints allow scientists to digitally reconstruct and gradually improve the data.

Data and neuron models used in the current reconstructions are already available at the NeuroMicrocuitry Web Portal of the project. This will soon be accessible via the Brain Simulation Tool of the Human Brain Project.

Benefits and Inconveniences:

  • In the form of a virtual brain, the information and memories of great personalities can be preserved indefinitely and treatment for different brain disorders can be studied.
  • The key drawback of the blue brain is that stored information can be vulnerable and hackers can exploit or misuse it.

EndNote:

In March 2020, the Blue Brain Project of EPFL launched a SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) project resource site. They made available its technological and human capital and knowledge to hospitals, COVID-19 researchers, and decision-makers to help resolve the enormous global challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Blue Brain has established a broad supercomputing infrastructure over the years. This has a large team of uniquely trained computer scientists, modelers, mathematicians, computer scientists, programmers, and technical support workers.

Original Article : Blue Brain Project — The Start Towards Evolution Of Human Brain

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