The Human Brain Project (HBP) is a major European scientific research initiative to improve our understanding of the brain and the role it plays in making us human, and to exploit the opportunities offered by the resulting knowledge. The size and complexity of the brain make this an expensive undertaking, but the costs associated with our current ignorance are rising and the potential gains from better insight into the brain are increasing. Brain-related diseases, many of which are age-related, now represent a major part of the global health burden and there are both ethical and economic imperatives to keep the growing number of older people healthier and more productive. Economic advantage is increasingly linked to artificial intelligence (AI), our ability to create technology to extract, manipulate and harness knowledge. The HBP’s comprehension of what makes the human brain so efficient and flexible should help to maintain Europe’s competitiveness and innovation potential in this area. The HBP is one of several brain research initiatives and projects around the world, albeit one of the first, but it is unique in a number of ways. Only the HBP has an explicit focus on both neuroscience and computing. It is also the broadest and most integrated brain initiative, and the only one aiming to build a research infrastructure to accelerate brain research. The HBP is a FET Flagship which started under FP7 and continues under H2020 with a succession of Specific Grant Agreements (SGAs) under a Framework Partnership Agreement (FPA). In its FP7 Ramp-Up Phase (2013-16) and subsequent SGA1 funding period (2016-18), the HBP implemented a scientific project of rare ambition, breadth and scale, and forged its diverse constituents into a functioning entity. On the scientific side, it not only identified critical gaps in our understanding of the brain, but also created tools and obtained data to fill many of them. It designed, built and demonstrated six ICT research platforms, supporting neuroinformatics, brain simulation, high-performance analytics and computing, medical informatics, brain-inspired computing and linking of simulated brains to robotic bodies. The results have been made available to the scientific community. The HBP also learnt to address underperformance and conflicts, and opened up the Project via competitive calls and the integration of Partnering Projects. In the upcoming SGA2 funding period (2018-20), the HBP will continue to strengthen global brain research efforts by extending coordination with other brain initiatives and projects. Internally, it will continue its unique inter-disciplinary co-design approach, developing research infrastructure capabilities via use cases built around specific research needs. This approach will underpin its critical scientific work of understanding how to bridge between the different scales of brain organisation, a key prerequisite to understand the principles of brain organisation. It will include gathering data to support detailed modelling, notably of the human hippocampus, as well as structural, functional and connectivity data to improve systemic understanding of the whole brain. The HBP will also investigate brain similarities and differences between individuals and between species. It will model key brain functions, including visual recognition, slow-wave activity, episodic memory and consciousness in rodents and humans, and elaborate their cognitive architectures. In addition, it will develop simplified brain models to support further development of brain-inspired computing. SGA2 will see the individual infrastructure platforms extended and integrated into the HBP Joint Platform (HBP-JP). The JP will make HBP services more robust and improve the user experience, encouraging wider use of its tools. SGA2 should thus see a shift from supplier-driven to user-driven capabilities, while the infrastructure underpinning them will be tied closely into EU efforts to integrate and stre

The last of four multi-year work plans will take the HBP to the end of its original incarnation as an EU Future and Emerging Technology Flagship. The plan is that the end of the Flagship will see the start of a new, enduring European scientific research infrastructure, EBRAINS, hopefully on the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) roadmap. The SGA3 work plan builds on the strong scientific foundations laid in the preceding phases, makes structural adaptations to profit from lessons learned along the way (e.g. transforming the previous Subprojects and Co-Design Projects into fewer, stronger, well-integrated Work Packages) and introduces new participants, with additional capabilities. The SGA3 work plan is built around improved integration and a sharpening of focus, to ensure a strong HBP legacy at the end of this last SGA. In previous phases, the HBP laid the foundation for empowering empirical and theoretical neuroscience to approaching the different spatial and temporal scales using state-of-the-art neuroinformatics, simulation, neuromorphic computing, neurorobotics, as well as high-performance analytics and computing. While these disciplines have been evolving for some years, we now see a convergence in this field and a dramatic speeding-up of progress. Data is driving a scientific revolution that relies heavily on computing to analyse data and to provide the results to the research community. Only with strong computer support, is it possible to translate information into knowledge, into a deeper understanding of brain organisation and diseases, and into technological innovation. In this respect, the underlying Fenix HPC and data e-infrastructure, co-designed with the HBP, will be key. The services offered by EBRAINS will be grouped in six Service Categories: SC1: Curated and shared data: EBRAINS FAIR data services - neuroscience data publishing SC2: Brain atlas services: navigate the brain in 3D - find, contribute and analyse brain data, based on location SC3: Brain modelling and simulation workflows: integrated tools to create and investigate models of the brain SC4: Closed loop AI and robotics workflows: design, test and implement robotic and AI solutions SC5: Medical brain activity data platform: human intracerebral EEG database and analysis service SC6: Interactive workflows on HPC or NMC: Europe-wide access to scalable and interactive compute services Their users are to be supported with High-Level Support Teams and Vouchers, as well as Engagement and Facility Hubs located around Europe, at which additional services, unique equipment and compute infrastructure will be offered by local HBP Partners. Significant outcomes in relevant scientific communities are expected to materialise rapidly. Association with new Partnering Projects is still sought, along with wider international cooperation. The SGA3 objectives can be summarised as: 1) Establish a sustainable European scientific research infrastructure, EBRAINS, leading to an increased use and adoption of FAIR data, web-based analyses, model building, simulation, atlasing, and virtual experiments for brain research and brain-inspired sciences. 2) Provide a multi-level atlas of the human brain - the first of its kind that links microstructural detail and inter-subject variability. 3) Increase the capacity of neuroscientists for multiscale neural activity modelling of the human brain network. 4) Increase the availability of integrated multiscale data and computational models supporting brain states transitions, network complexity and cognitive functions. 5) Enhance real-world task performance through biologically plausible adaptive cognitive architectures running on neuromorphic hardware and a closed-loop Neurorobotics Platform. 6) Ensure that neuroscientific insights at the interface of neuro-inspired computing and technology are being translated into a benefit for patients with brain diseases. 7) Ensure an ethically and legally compliant infrastru

Five leading European supercomputing centres are committed to develop, within their respective national programs and service portfolios, a set of services that will be federated across a consortium. The work will be undertaken by the following supercomputing centres, which form the High Performance Analytics and Computing (HPAC) Platform of the Human Brain Project (HBP): ▪ Barcelona Supercomputing Centre (BSC) in Spain, ▪ The Italian supercomputing centre CINECA, ▪ The Swiss National Supercomputing Centre CSCS, ▪ The Jülich Supercomputing Centre in Germany, and ▪ Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA), France (joining in April 2018). The new consortium will be called Fenix and it aims at providing scalable compute and data services in a federated manner. The neuroscience community is of particular interest in this context and the HBP represents a prioritised driver for the Fenix infrastructure design and implementation. The Interactive Computing E-Infrastructure for the HBP (ICEI) project will realise key elements of this Fenix infrastructure that are targeted to meet the needs of the neuroscience community. The participating sites plan for cloud-like services that are compatible with the work cultures of scientific computing and data science. Specifically, this entails developing interactive supercomputing capabilities on the available extreme computing and data systems. Key features of the ICEI infrastructure are: ▪ Scalable compute resources; ▪ A federated data infrastructure; and ▪ Interactive Compute Services providing access to the federated data infrastructure as well as elastic access to the scalable compute resources. The ICEI e-infrastructure will be realised through a coordinated procurement of equipment and R&D services. Furthermore, significant additional parts of the infrastructure and R&D services will be realised within the ICEI project through in-kind contributions from the participating supercomputing centres.

Understanding the human brain is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our time. Such an understanding can provide profound insights into our humanity, leading to fundamentally new computing technologies, and transforming the diagnosis and treatment of brain disorders. Modern ICT brings this prospect within reach. The HBP Flagship Initiative (HBP) thus proposes a unique strategy that uses ICT to integrate neuroscience data from around the world, to develop a unified multi-level understanding of the brain and diseases, and ultimately to emulate its computational capabilities. The goal is to catalyze a global collaborative effort. During the HBP’s first Specific Grant Agreement (SGA1), the HBP Core Project will outline the basis for building and operating a tightly integrated Research Infrastructure, providing HBP researchers and the scientific Community with unique resources and capabilities. Partnering Projects will enable independent research groups to expand the capabilities of the HBP Platforms, in order to use them to address otherwise intractable problems in neuroscience, computing and medicine in the future. In addition, collaborations with other national, European and international initiatives will create synergies, maximizing returns on research investment. SGA1 covers the detailed steps that will be taken to move the HBP closer to achieving its ambitious Flagship Objectives.