Stanford gets $10 million to study how the brain runs on about 20 watts, with lessons for Alzheimer’s and energy-hungry AI
The award is part of an $80 million Simons Foundation project with 26 scientists. It is basic research that will take years, starting with flies, worms and mice.
Stanford University scientists will receive $10 million from the Simons Foundation, a private science charity, to study how the brain makes and spends energy, Stanford Medicine announced.
The brain makes up about 2% of the body’s volume but uses about a fifth of its energy, according to Stanford Medicine. How that energy is divided among the brain’s billions of nerve cells and their support cells, called glia, is poorly understood.
“The human brain is powered by only 20 watts of power, yet it does amazing things,” said Thomas Clandinin, a Stanford professor of neurobiology.
What the project will study
The grant is part of an $80 million international effort called the Simons Collaboration on Brain Energetics, or SCOBE, with 26 researchers. Clandinin is a co-director. The team will study how much energy single cells need, how energy is shared across networks that handle tasks such as vision and memory, how the brain steers blood to the areas that need it, and how it copes when energy runs short.
The work will start with simple animals and move up: from single cells to worms and fruit flies, then mice and then people. Clandinin’s own lab will study how fruit flies process what they see when their cells get less sugar or oxygen, to learn how much energy a brain computation costs.
Why it matters
Diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s are linked to changes in how the brain uses energy, so better understanding could help explain them, Stanford Medicine says. The research could also suggest ways to cut the energy that AI needs. This is basic research; it does not test treatments.
Six other Stanford researchers are part of the grant, including neurobiology professor Lisa Giocomo, electrical engineering and bioengineering professor Kwabena Boahen and applied physics associate professor Surya Ganguli.