Computer brain unit opens

A major research centre on the brain opened at University College London, this week. It will perform highly theoretical research.

The Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit, which will employ 100 scientists, aims to give the UK a global lead in computation neuroscience, at present dominated by the United States.

It will be headed by Geoffrey Hinton, who has returned from North America. Other eminent academics include Peter Dayan of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Zoubin Ghahramani from Toronto University and Zhaoping Li from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Research will be funded over the next ten years by a Pounds 10 million donation from the Gatsby Foundation, a charity set up by David Sainsbury, the science minister. The cash will be used for basic research projects in areas such as artificial intelligence, neural networks and statistics.

Brain maker, page 17

David Sainsbury, page 8