Extensive knowledge about the human brain and its functioning already exists but is highly fragmented. The goal of the Human Brain Project is to pull together this knowledge and to reconstruct the brain, piece by piece, in supercomputer-based models and simulations. The models offer the prospect of a new understanding of the human brain and its diseases and of completely new computing and robotic technologies.
Neurorobitics - a first feasibility check
Scientists of the Technische Universitaet Muenchen will coordinate the part of the project focusing on Neurorobotics. It is here that with simulated and real systems the feasibility of the conceptual models will first be tested. The systems consist of sensors for data acquisition, data-processing elements, and actuators to carry out operations. "Our tests will show if the models' basic assumptions work," says Professor Alois Knoll, Chair for Real-time Systems and Robotics at TUM. "Then other groups in the project will use our test results to refine their models."