Focusing on the Biology of the Brain

Health & Wellness

Focusing on the Biology of the Brain

By
Joel Streed

October 9, 2015

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI0aFplx7n4
Journalists: Broadcast quality sound bites with Dr. Lee and Kevin Bennet are available in the downloads. To read a transcript of their quotes, click here. MEDIA CONTACT:  507-284-5005 or newsbureau@mayo.edu.

The Mayo Clinic Neural Engineering Laboratory is hosting a symposium on the federal Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative October 9-10, 2015, at the Mayo Clinic campus in Rochester, Minn. "What we’re going to be able to do is showcase all the work that is being done in a variety of laboratories across the nation focused on the biology of the brain," says Kevin Bennet, chair of the Mayo Clinic Division of Engineering.

Dr. Walter Koroshetz, the newly announced director of the National Institutes of Health's/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, will be the keynote speaker. The BRAIN Initiative is a major federal research funding initiative announced by the White House in April 2013 as a partnership between government agencies, corporations, research groups and private philanthropic foundations.

“The BRAIN Initiative is to develop novel technologies to probe the function and the structure of the brain," says Kendall Lee, M.D., Ph.D., a neurosurgeon and director of the Mayo Clinic Neural Engineering Laboratory. "Through these types of technologies here at Mayo Clinic, we are [using] implantable devices to treat a whole variety of disorders. For example, in deep brain stimulation, we are now able to implant electrodes that are able to help our patients with Parkinson’s disease, tremor, dystonia. And, now we’re moving into even treating psychiatric disorders, like Tourette’s and obsessive compulsive disorder, as well as depression."

Learn more: Mayo Clinic to host the BRAIN Initiative symposium