Carnegie Mellon University’s BrainHub will host its first Neurohackathon May 24-25. The event is one of the first hackathons to engage computer scientists in using one of the hardest systems to crack: the structure of neural data and the brain.
The brain has billions of neurons and trillions of synapses, making it an excellent source of big data. BrainHub researchers from across CMU’s Pittsburgh campus have collected vast amounts of information from the brain using techniques including MRI and electrophysiological recordings. Through this hackathon, they hope to develop new methods for analyzing and understanding this data and foster new collaborative relationships between neuro- and computer scientists.
“Getting these smart and creative young minds to look at neural data will bring 21st century tools and ideas to brain science research,” said Alison Barth, interim director of BrainHub and professor of biological sciences.
During the hackathon, teams of graduate students from CMU’s School of Computer Science will be asked to analyze data sets gathered from the labs of neuroscience researchers in the College of Engineering, Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Mellon College of Science and School of Computer Science. The teams will compete for prizes including travel awards and one semester of graduate tuition.
The Neurohackathon is sponsored by Qualcomm and CMU’s Provost’s Office, BrainHub and Department of Machine Learning.