Notices of Funding Opportunities

Invasive surgical procedures provide the unique ability to record and stimulate neurons within precisely localized brain structures in humans. Human studies using invasive technology are often constrained by a limited number of patients and resources available to implement complex experimental protocols and are rarely aggregated in a manner that addresses research questions with appropriate statistical power. Therefore, this RFA seeks applications to assemble diverse, integrated, multi-disciplinary teams that cross boundaries of interdisciplinary collaboration to overcome these fundamental barriers and to investigate high-impact questions in human neuroscience. Projects should maximize opportunities to conduct innovative in vivo neuroscience research made available by direct access to brain recording and stimulating from invasive surgical procedures. Projects should employ approaches guided by specified theoretical constructs and quantitative, mechanistic models where appropriate. Awardees will join a consortium work group, coordinated by the NIH, to identify consensus standards of practice, including neuroethical considerations, to collect and provide data for ancillary studies, and to aggregate and standardize data for dissemination among the wider scientific community.

The purpose of this Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies® (BRAIN) Initiative funding opportunity announcement is to encourage applications that will develop and validate novel tools to facilitate the detailed analysis and manipulation of complex circuits in large brains. Critical advances in the treatment of brain disorders in human populations are hindered by our lack of ability to monitor and manipulate circuitry in safe, minimally-invasive ways. Clinical intervention with novel cell and circuit specific tools will require extensive focused research designed to remove barriers to delivery of gene therapies. In addition to identification and removal of barriers, the need to specifically target dysfunctional circuitry poses additional challenges. Neuroscience has experienced an impressive influx of exciting new research tools in the past decade, especially since the launch of The BRAIN Initiative®. However, the majority of these cutting-edge tools have been developed for use in model organisms, primarily rodents, fish and flies. These cutting-edge tools, such as viral delivery of genetic constructs, are increasingly adaptable to larger mammalian brains and more importantly are emerging as potential human therapeutic strategies for brain disorders. A pressing need to develop tools for use in large brains or those that are more directly relevant to the human brain is the focus of this initiative. The initiative will support initial proof of principle studies aimed at demonstrating the feasibility of this approach in humans and other mammalian species (non-human primate [NHP]/sheep/pigs).

The purpose of this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is to support the development of novel tools and technologies through the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program to advance the field of neuroscience research. This FOA specifically supports the development of novel neurotechnologies as well as the translation of technologies developed through The BRAIN initiative® or through other funding programs, towards commercialization. Funding can support the iterative refinement of these tools and technologies with the end-user community, with an end-goal of scaling manufacture towards reliable, broad, sustainable dissemination and incorporation into regular neuroscience practice

The purpose of this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is to support the development of novel tools and technologies through the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program to advance the field of neuroscience research. This FOA specifically supports the development of novel neurotechnologies as well as the translation of technologies developed through The BRAIN initiative® or through other funding programs, towards commercialization. Funding can support the iterative refinement of these tools and technologies with the end-user community, with an end-goal of scaling manufacture towards reliable, broad, sustainable dissemination and incorporation into regular neuroscience practice.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) solicits applications to develop informatics tools for analyzing, visualizing, and integrating data related to The BRAIN Initiative® or to enhance our understanding of the brain.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) solicits applications to develop web-accessible data archives to capture, store, and curate data related to BRAIN Initiative activities. The data archives will work with the research community to incorporate tools that allow users to analyze and visualize the data, but the creation of such tools is not part of this FOA. The data archives will use appropriate standards to describe the data, but the creation of such standards is not part of this FOA. A goal of this program is to advance research by creating a community resource data archive with appropriate standards and summary information that is broadly available and accessible to the research community for furthering research.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) solicits applications to develop standards that describe experimental protocols that are being conducted as part of The BRAIN Initiative®. It is expected that applications will solicit community input at all stages of the process. It is recommended that the first step of standard development will involve sharing data between different key groups in the experimental community in order to ensure that the developing standard will cover the way that all of those groups are collecting data. The developed standard is expected to be made widely available.

The purpose of this FOA is to promote the integration of experimental, analytic, and theoretical capabilities for large-scale analysis of neural systems and circuits. This FOA seeks applications for exploratory research studies that use new and emerging methods for large scale recording and manipulation of neural circuits across multiple brain regions. Applications should propose to elucidate the contributions of dynamic circuit activity to a specific behavioral or neural system. Applications should seek to understand circuits of the central nervous system by systematically controlling stimuli and/or behavior while actively recording and/or manipulating relevant dynamic patterns of neural activity and by measuring the resulting behaviors and/or perceptions. Studies should incorporate rich information on cell-types, on circuit functionality and connectivity, and should be performed in conjunction with sophisticated analysis of complex, ethologically relevant behaviors. Applications should propose teams of investigators that seek to cross boundaries of interdisciplinary collaboration by bridging fields and linking theory and data analysis to experimental design. Exploratory studies supported by this FOA are intended to develop experimental capabilities and quantitative, theoretical frameworks in preparation for a future competition for larger-scale, multi-component, Team-Research BRAIN Circuit Programs (U19).

The purpose of this Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies® (BRAIN) Initiative is to encourage applications that will develop and validate novel tools to facilitate the detailed analysis of complex circuits and provide insights into cellular interactions that underlie brain function. The new tools and technologies should inform and/or exploit cell-type and/or circuit-level specificity. Plans for validating the utility of the tool/technology will be an essential feature of a successful application. The development of new genetic and non-genetic tools for delivering genes, proteins and chemicals to cells of interest or approaches that are expected to target specific cell types and/or circuits in the nervous system with greater precision and sensitivity than currently established methods are encouraged. Tools that can be used in a number of species/model organisms rather than those restricted to a single species are highly desired. Applications that provide approaches that break through existing technical barriers to substantially improve current capabilities are highly encouraged.

This FOA solicits applications for research projects that use innovative, methodologically-integrated approaches to understand how circuit activity gives rise to mental experience and behavior. The goal is to support projects that can realize a meaningful outcome within 5 years. Applications should address circuit function in the context of specific neural systems such as sensation, perception, attention, reasoning, intention, decision-making, emotion, navigation, communication or homeostasis. Projects should link theory and data analysis to experimental design and should produce predictive models as deliverables. Projects should aim to improve the understanding of circuits of the central nervous system by systematically controlling stimuli and/or behavior while actively recording and/or manipulating dynamic patterns of neural activity. Projects can use non-human and human species, and applications should explain how the selected species offers ideal conditions for revealing general principles about the circuit basis of a specific behavior.