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Brain Circle |
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| The Brain Circle |
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It is now widely accepted that the enigma of the brain is the most challenging intellectual endeavor of the 21st century, "The Century of the Brain."
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The Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation (ICNC) invites you to personally participate in its ongoing, impressive achievements in brain research by joining its Brain Circle (BC), an exclusive membership group of 50 families from around the world.
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| Become Part of the Solution - Join the Brain Circle |
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Your membership in the Brain Circle will make you a partner in breaking research frontiers and in curing devastating neurological diseases; it will enable you to have an open dialogue with Center researchers who specialize in a variety of research areas, including dysfunctions and illnesses (such as Parkinson's disease, dyslexia, and stress, memory and movement disorders) on the one hand, and unraveling the operation of human senses such as vision, hearing and of creative pursuits, on the other hand.
BC members commit themselves to supporting the ICNC with a minimum donation of €10,000 per year over the course of five years. These donations will support doctoral student fellowships in brain research, research activities at various ICNC laboratories (including the purchase of necessary state-of-the-art equipment), and interaction and collaboration with other top research centers via scientific meetings and international exchange programs.
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| Brain Research at the Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation |
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While our brain is the source of remarkable emotions and abilities - creativity, thought, cognition, movement, love, and curiosity - it is also at the core of many debilitating diseases. Increased understanding of these multifaceted aspects of the brain - indeed, of the enigma of the brain - can be provided only via a synthesis of converging approaches. This converging approach to brain research is at the core of the ICNC, the only brain research center in both Israel and in Europe that ever won recognition as a "Center of Excellence" by the European Commission. At the ICNC, physicists, psychologists, engineers, computer scientists and philosophers work side by side with neurobiologists and physicians, cultivating the next generation of "renaissance" students, in an integrated, interdisciplinary environment where "the experimentalist and theoretician reside in the same brain."
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| ICNC Activities |
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Research in 24 brain research laboratories - from the molecular level to whole-brain imaging; from research on memory, sleep, vision and audition to the study of dyslexia, Parkinson's disease, movement control, spinal cord deficiencies, stress, and brain modeling.
Creation of the most prestigious Ph.D. program in "Brain Research: Computation and Information Processing," the largest of its kind in the world, with fellowships available for its 60 students.
Scientific exchange programs with top universities and institutions such as Caltech, Pasadena; Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris; Institute for Neuroinformatics, Zurich; Brain and Mind Institute, Lausanne; Max Planck Institutes in Frankfurt, Heidelberg, and Munich; University of Brussels, Belgium; the Gatsby Unit for Computational Neuroscience, London; and the Brain Research Institute, Amsterdam.
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| ICNC Scientific Achievements |
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ICNC researchers have made scientific breakthroughs in the following realms:
- First steps in developing a new closed-loop multi-electrode system for brain-machine interface to be used for both stimulating the brain (e.g., for Parkinson's patients) and for recording electrical signals in the behaving brain in order to activate a robotic limb directly from the brain (for paraplegics and amputees).
- Development of a new blood test which can detect susceptibility to stress in humans.
- Utilization of new optical probes for detecting micro-changes in the living brain associated with learning and memory processes.
- Demonstration, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology, that amazingly, the visual system in blind people from birth is used for language processing.
- Development of a new theory ("the reverse hierarchy") for how we perceive the whole ("gestalt") from minute details and vice versa.
- Uncovering principles by which the brain generates rhythms during periods of sleep and movement control.
- Bringing together artists and brain-scientists for a synergetic joint exploration of creativity, aesthetic feelings and how to broaden the scope of brain research in the 21st century.
- Developing new and powerful theoretical approaches for understanding how the nervous system processes sensory information and generates movement.
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| The Brain Circle |
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ICNC members believe that only a circle of many brains can achieve vital breakthroughs in brain research. The ICNC thus actively collaborates with research centers worldwide as well as with groups of enthusiastic friends and supporters who share the same dream of better understanding our brain and developing cures to brain-related diseases.
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| Benefits of Brain Circle Membership |
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BC members actively contribute to groundbreaking research at the ICNC that will lead to a better understanding of the enigma of the brain, thereby helping to cure devastating neurodegenerative diseases and fostering the intellectual and sociological well-being of people both in the State of Israel and throughout the world.
BC members meet annually with several top ICNC researchers - in Israel or in Europe. During these one-day meetings, BC members will be updated about frontiers in brain research and state-of-the-art approaches to neurological diseases. These meetings will encourage an open dialogue and foster close relationships between ICNC researchers and BC members.
BC members are an integral part of the ICNC. They are invited to lectures by ICNC faculty (given four times a year in English to the general public) and receive comprehensive reports of ICNC activities and scientific publications, which include a summary of BC events.
The generosity of BC members will be acknowledged in ICNC publications.
At the end of the third year of active membership, each BC member will have his or her name engraved on a special plaque, which will be placed prominently in the new ICNC home currently under construction at the Alexander Silberman Institute of Life Sciences on the Edmond J. Safra Campus in Givat Ram.
Join the Brain Circle. Become a partner in breaking research frontiers and curing diseases.
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 Brochure
Registration Form
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