Blue Brain Project
EPFL’s Blue Brain Project is a Swiss brain research Initiative led by Founder and Director Professor Henry Markram.
This mission was completed after developing all the main algorithms required to build biologically faithful digital copies of the brain, including;
- Generating the volumes and dimensions of all brain regions,
- Populating neurons and glia according to their densities and distributions in each brain region,
- Defining morphological, electrical, and genetic cell types in each brain region,
- Computationally growing the dendrites of an unlimited number of neurons expressing their variety of morphological types in each brain region,
- Modeling an unlimited number of neurons expressing their variety of electrical behaviors,
- Growing all the local, regional and whole brain axons of every type of neuron in the mouse brain
- Recreating the connectome down to a neuron to neuron level,
- Modeling various types of synapse formed between any two neurons in the brain,
- Simulating neurons, brain regions, brain systems and the whole mouse brain on supercomputers and in the cloud.
The aim of Blue Brain is to establish simulation neuroscience as a complementary approach alongside experimental, theoretical and clinical neuroscience to understanding the brain, by building the world’s first biologically detailed digital reconstructions and simulations of the mouse brain.
The supercomputer-based simulations and reconstructions built by Blue Brain offer a radically new approach for understanding the multi-level structure and function of the brain.
All the algorithms (which represent over 18 million lines of code), models and data were published in around 300 peer-reviewed papers and were packaged in an open data platform to leverage and continue advancing simulation neuroscience.
From 2025, an independent not-for-profit foundation is launched to support the global community in utilizing simulation neuroscience to study the brain and its diseases. The foundation provides virtual neuroscience labs, enabling users to explore, build, and simulate digital replicas of parts or entire brains, potentially for any species, age, gender, or condition.
Funding
Blue Brain was funded by the Swiss federal government, with oversight provided by the ETH Board and hosting provided by the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
News
All the news about the Blue Brain Project
The Real Neuron Challenge
The Real Neuron Challenge
Can you tell the difference between a synthesized or biological neuron?
Events
See when the next Blue Brain Conference or Seminar will be held
Publications
Blue Brain has published 245 papers and pre-prints in scientific journals.
Blue Brain Portal
A knowledge space for simulation neuroscience
