In April, President Obama announced a sweeping research initiative intended to expand our knowledge of the human brain and our ability to treat ailments and injuries of the brain, including traumatic brain injury (TBI).
Entitled Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN), the imitative is intended to map the brain and evoke an investigative and technological effort that President Obama hopes will reach a level of research and development not seen since the height of the Space Race.
Initial funding will be provided to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA).
As yet, BRAIN does not have specific objectives. The President hopes to better define and refine its ten-year research goals in collaboration with research partners in the next year. Each year high-level neuroscience adds to our knowledge of the complex functioning of the brain. This initiative is intended to deepen that knowledge and quicken the development of treatments and technologies to treat TBI and ailments like Alzheimer’s disease and schizophrenia.
Medical science has gained a better grasp of TBI. For patients who suffer grievous injuries, there is currently little hope for a cure to damaged neural material in the brain or the spinal cord. Expanded investigation into the electrical and chemical communication within the circuitry of the brain could provide hope to individuals and their families who suffer TBI in car collisions, falls and other accidents.
As with any true exploration of the human condition, hopes are big, definitions are few. For those whose lives are touched or destroyed by traumatic brain injury, BRAIN may provide a pathway forward after catastrophic injury. Contact a personal injury attorney if you have suffered TBI through another’s negligence, carelessness or recklessness.