[Music]
the human brain is incredibly complex in
understanding how it functions could be
one of the biggest scientific efforts
ever undertaken I think this could be
one of the most difficult things that
humans have ever attempted to do to get
a physical basis for our thoughts our
actions our emotions and our behavior
could be literally the most challenging
project that anyone has ever tried why
are human brains different than animals
what happens in the brain that leads to
mental illness or degenerative issues
these are puzzles that haven't yet been
solved by science everyone wants to
understand what it means to be human how
is it that this organ in our heads gives
us all of these perceptions and
understanding and feeling and when we
get to an understanding of how that
comes about mechanistically I think it's
really going to change our view of what
it is that we are and what it means to
be human the University of Chicago has
made a big effort to grow its study of
the neurosciences that's one of the
reasons why Bobby Kasturi came here to
work on the brain mapping project and
his background and enthusiasm actually
for tackling ridiculously big problems
like this one is what I find exciting
you know he's kind of bold and brave so
at a basic level what Bobby is trying to
do is to figure out what is the map of
the brain in terms of all of these
connections all of the cells how they
connected to each other and what does
this mean what does it mean for not in
in the context of normal brain function
and what happens to these connections in
in the context of various diseases the
power of the tools provided by are gone
along with the university's efforts in
neuroscience make this a unique
environment the university's
connectivity to Argonne and not in
particular our operating of Argonne for
the US Department of Energy gives us a
very particular relationship in very
particular opportunities for using this
type of infrastructure that again as I
say there's no university
world that can have this level and scale
of infrastructure I think there's a
great opportunity here at the University
of Chicago to do something really
special in neuroscience Argonne
obviously gives us a type of data that
we wouldn't be able to get anywhere else
but there's more than that
the University has a long tradition of
rigorous thought quantitative approaches
and interdisciplinary work which is
central to neuroscience two things are
unique to Argonne that will be crucial
to this work we have big machines here
on the scale that you can't find
anywhere else often on the planet so for
example two of the things that Argonne
has are leading computing so that means
that we have bigger faster more powerful
computers than anywhere else and another
tool that Argonne has with the Advanced
Photon Source which is a huge microscope
the Advanced Photon Source is currently
the most powerful x-ray in the world and
it is being modified to become a
thousand times stronger argon is also
building a new supercomputer unlike
anything the world has ever seen it will
take this kind of power to do the brain
mapping work looking at the connections
the wiring diagrams of the brain doing
exhaustive reconstructions of small
parts of brain circuits where we can see
every connection between every cell and
at least a limited part of brain that's
new information that's the sort of thing
we've never had before and with what's
available at Argonne we can do it here
uniquely in the world so we're proposing
in a single experiment to collect
volumes of data which are as large as
anything has ever been done
the only place you could actually do
that is here the brain contains billions
of neurons each of these neurons
connects with other cells forming
quadrillions of connections that's why
it's so important to have huge computing
resources for this effort
that diagram of how every neuron
connects to every neuron not only
contains all the information about you
your personality your memories etc but
then many of the things that we call
illnesses are Mis routings Mis wirings
of that diagram but the brain continues
to change throughout our lives somehow
we learn from experiences but scientists
don't quite understand how that works
this is the fundamental nature of the
human condition we are born completely
helpless completely useless and
completely hapless every one of us grows
into adults that learn a million things
about the world around us learn how the
world works and how to manipulate it and
I realized if I could figure that out I
could actually figure out in my view the
fundamental thing it means to be human
this is what the University of Chicago
and Argonne National Laboratory are all
about attracting the best minds to
tackle the biggest challenges of
humankind faces I think that we are
committed as an institution to creating
interesting opportunities that allow the
best and most creative people to
flourish advancing artificial
intelligence is just one of the possible
benefits of brain mapping mental health
and curing degenerative diseases of the
brain are natural areas where brain
mapping can have a great impact another
area is energy much of the world's
energy will one day be used to move data
to from the cloud the brain is
incredibly energy efficient operating on
only about 20 watts of power
scientists think unlocking some of the
secrets of the brain might lead to more
energy efficient computers understanding
the brain I think has broad reaching
societal implications beyond
understanding the kidney or the
liver these include the future of
computing the future of artificial
intelligence the future of energy and
literally if I can push this imagine
that we can even understand the
biological basis of mental disorders a
roadmap of the most complex intricate
thing known what will this do for
mankind will a cure mental illness and
the suffering of Alzheimer's will it
make robots who are capable of things we
can only currently imagine will it solve
a pending energy crisis it could be one
of the greatest scientific endeavors of
all time and it's happening now
[Music]