Anton Arkhipov

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Racing toward the digital brain

Leading whole-brain modeling efforts

Scientists at Germany's Jülich Research Centre demonstrated in mid-January 2026 that Europe's most powerful supercomputer can simulate 20 billion spiking neurons—matching the scale of the human cerebral cortex. The team plans to combine this capability with anatomical brain data to run full-cortex simulations, a technical milestone that has eluded researchers since the field's founding in the 1980s.

Updated May 22

Notable Quotes

"This shows the door is open. We can run these kinds of brain simulations effectively with enough computing power. It's a technical milestone giving us confidence that much larger models are not only possible, but achievable with precision and scale."

from Racing toward the digital brain · Updated May 22

"Our work shows that very detailed microscopic-level simulations of larger brains may be possible sooner than previously expected."

from Racing toward the digital brain · Updated May 22