The Werner Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience (CIN) is the University’s cross-faculty centre for systems and cognitive neuroscience. It consists of 28 research groups, belonging to the faculties of life sciences, medicine, and humanities, with associations to the Max Planck Institutes, the Bernstein Centre for Computational Neuroscience, and the Hertie Institute for clinical neuroscience, among others. The CIN was originally founded as a Cluster of Excellence and funded by the German federal and state governments from 2009 until 2019, and now continuous to be the university’s prime cross-faculty centre for systems and cognitive neuroscience.
State-of-the-art research, latest techniques
The aim of the CIN is to understand how the brain – from the level of synapses up to the level of whole-brain circuits – produces intelligent, adaptive, and robust behaviour. Research combines state-of-the-art measures of behaviour, electrophysiology, and neuroimaging with the latest techniques in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and model-building. Research at the CIN is predominantly basic research, although it counts many application-focused institutions among its many different internal and external collaborating partners. Research is hence also relevant for the development of artificial intelligent systems as well as for gaining insights in clinical syndromes and for development of effective therapies.
Due to the shared interest of both the CIN and the humanities in uncovering the fundamental underpinnings of human behaviour, the CIN also seeks close interaction with the Humanities. The CIN hence organizes a number of well-received summer schools, workshops (e.g. “Games of the Brain” series) and conferences. It is well complemented by the annual CIN “Dialogues between the Neurosciences and the Arts and Humanities”, a discussion series on topics of broad interest.
