NeuroVentures

Bio-X leadership recognized that Stanford has the talent base, an institutional culture of teamwork, invention, and entrepreneurialism, and, in short, is the right place to lead the new interdisciplinary science of the brain and cognition. To that end, Bio-X launched NeuroVentures in 2008 with the appointment of Dr. William T. Newsome.

NeuroVentures focuses on dramatically stimulating and accelerating interdisciplinary research to answer some of the most challenging questions concerning the body’s most complex organ, the brain. From its base in the Clark Center, home of Bio-X, NeuroVentures has significantly helped develop new technologies and approaches requiring novel interdisciplinary collaborations between neuroscientists, engineers, physicists, and other members of the Stanford community. Specifically, NeuroVentures has dramatically catalyzed highly focused research in four target areas: Cracking the Neural Code, Imaging and Stimulating the Living Human Brain, Brain Machine Interface (Neural Prosthetics), Neuroeconomics and Decision-Making.

Understanding brain function will require the tools of modern genetics to identify and manipulate neural circuits, the tools of physics and engineering to devise new instruments for measuring signal flow within circuits, the theoretical insights of mathematics and physics for understanding the behavior of dynamic systems, and the tools of psychological science for quantitative analysis of behavior. The success of NeuroVentures has led to Stanford’s recent establishment of a new interdisciplinary neuroscience institute. With Dr. Newsome appointed as director, the campus-wide brain research initiative will catalyze new interdisciplinary collaborations at the boundaries of neuroscience and a broad array of disciplines.

For more information on the new interdisciplinary neurosciences institute, please see the recent press release.

EXPLORE THE RESEARCH FUNDED BY NEUROVENTURES view the NeuroVentures white paper