President Obama announced the Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies Initiative, known as the BRAIN Initiative, this morning. Many consider it this decade’s Human Genome Project, but as Carl Zimmer points out at The Loom, it might take a while to meet those expectations:
In his speech this morning, Obama sketched out all sorts of amazing possibilities: cures for Alzheimer’s disease, prosthetic limbs for the paralyzed, and lots of brain-related jobs. If that’s the ultimate goal of this plan, today’s announcement feels like a very soft launch. Obama announced $100 million in funding for 2014 for a project now dubbed the BRAIN Initiative.