Imaging and the Human Brain Project: a review

Abstract

Objectives: Survey current work primarily funded by the US Human Brain Project (HBP) that involves substantial use of images. Organize this work around a framework based on the physical organization of the body.

Methods: Pointers to individual research efforts were obtained through the HBP home page as well as personal contracts from HBP annual meetings. References from these sources were followed to find closely related work. The individual research efforts were then studied and characterized.

Results: The subject of the review is the intersection of neuroinformatics (information about the brain), imaging informatics (information about images), and structural informatics (information about the physical structure of the body). Of the 30 funded projects currently listed on the HBP web site, at least 22 make heavy use of images. These projects are described in terms of broad categories of structural imaging, functional imaging, and image-based brain information systems.

Conclusions: Understanding the most complex entity known (the brain) gives rise to many interesting and difficult problems in informatics and computer science. Although much progress has been made by HBP and other neuroinformatics researchers, a great many problems remain that will require substantial informatics research efforts. Thus, the HPB can and should be seen as an excellent driving application area for biomedical informatics research.