The Center for Brain-inspired Computing Enabling Autonomous Intelligence, or C-BRIC, is a five-year project supported by $32 million in funding from the Semiconductor Research Corp. (SRC) via its Joint University Microelectronics Program, which provides funding from a consortium of industrial sponsors as well as from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The SRC operates research programs in the United States and globally that connect industry to university researchers, deliver early results to enable technological advances, and prepare a highly-trained workforce for the semiconductor industry.

The mission of the Center for Brain-inspired Computing (C-BRIC) is to deliver key advances in cognitive computing, with the goal of enabling a new generation of autonomous intelligent systems such as self-flying drones and interactive personal robots.

To address these challenges, C-BRIC will co-develop the next generation of neuro-inspired algorithms and theory, neuromorphic computing fabrics and distributed intelligence. We will leverage application drivers and cutting-edge testbeds already available with the PIs to provide context to the center’s research and evaluate its outcomes.

By bringing together a unique team of leading researchers from the fields of machine learning, computational neuroscience, theoretical computer science, neuromorphic hardware, distributed computing, robotics and autonomous systems, C-BRIC will pursue quantum improvements in cognitive systems that will be difficult for these communities to achieve independently.

The following ten universities have come together to pursue the goals of C-BRIC: