BRAIN at 10: A View from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health

This blog was originally posted on The BRAIN Blog.

The BRAIN Initiative is marking a milestone—10 years of advancing neuroscience and neurotechnology research by funding innovative projects. As part of a rotating series of blog posts, the directors of the BRAIN Initiative-partnering NIH Institutes and Centers share their voice and perspectives on the impact BRAIN has made on their respective missions—and vice versa.

1. How has the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) participated in the NIH BRAIN Initiative?

NCCIH has been a proud participant in the BRAIN Initiative since it began 10 years ago. Our Center is deeply interested in how brain-body interactions are influenced by physical, psychological, and nutritional complementary and integrative health approaches. By understanding brain structure and function at the level of both molecules and circuits, we can clarify brain-body relationships and interconnections, increasing our knowledge about whole person health.

2.  Why do you think it’s important for NCCIH to participate in the NIH BRAIN Initiative? 

We believe the goals of the BRAIN Initiative and NCCIH are synergistic. The first major objective in NCCIH’s Strategic Plan is to, “advance fundamental science and methods development,” and NCCIH funds innovative research to identify changes in brain structure and function in response to complementary and integrative health approaches. BRAIN-funded research helps us to do that by generating new tools to measure brain function more easily during interventions requiring physical movements, such as yoga and tai chi. For example, portable, head-only systems employing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), positron emission tomography (PET), or high-density diffusion optical tomography are allowing researchers to look inside the living brain in new ways. Beyond imaging brain regions, the BRAIN Initiative’s Understanding Circuits program will help researchers explore novel questions about the effects of complementary and integrative health approaches on functional networks of brain signals, or circuits, that often span multiple brain regions.

Powerful new tools and technologies can provide better visibility into what’s happening inside an individual’s brain: for example, through observing cerebrospinal fluid dynamics during yogic breathing. But we’ll also learn what’s going on in the body’s periphery by observing signals transmitted to the brain from joints and connective tissues. This information will help researchers develop a more holistic understanding of how body systems work together with each other and the brain.

3.What major BRAIN-funded scientific advancements or conversations has NCCIH been a part of? 

NCCIH has been a part of various BRAIN Initiative efforts related to our research priorities, including the Brain Behavior Quantification and Synchronization (BBQS) program. This exciting program has led to novel funding opportunities and workshops, including the Sensor Technologies To Improve Our Understanding of Complex Behavior Workshop. This event, held in May 2023, explored new ways to revolutionize how we record brain-body connections, toward transforming our basic and mechanistic understanding of complementary and integrative health approaches.

We are also particularly interested in interoception—the processes by which an organism senses, interprets, integrates, and regulates signals from within itself. NCCIH worked with BRAIN Initiative program staff to develop an interoception-focused notice of special interest linked to the BRAIN Understanding Circuits program. The goal of this research is to produce detailed maps of dynamic interoceptive circuits and to promote the adoption of powerful new tools for monitoring and modulating interoception circuit activity. We expect this research to yield significant advances toward understanding sensory processing and interoception in the central nervous system of both animals and humans.

4. How has the BRAIN Initiative advanced or shaped your mission? 

NCCIH’s involvement in the BRAIN Initiative will continue to advance our mission by generating critical knowledge and resources, such as highly refined brain cell maps like the BRAIN Initiative Cell Atlas Network and brain “wiring diagrams” via the BRAIN Initiative Connectivity Across Scales (BRAIN CONNECTS) program. Collectively, these efforts will also support investigators’ exploration of brain mechanisms of complementary and integrative health approaches. In turn, this knowledge will help optimize approaches to improve brain health as well as prevent and treat brain-related disorders.

Research funded by the BRAIN Initiative is poised to make significant strides in the ability to measure how behavior is linked to specific brain circuit activity and other underlying physiological processes. All told, future advances enabled by BRAIN Initiative research will offer unprecedented windows into brain-body relationships—critical information for developing and optimizing mechanistically informed mind and body interventions for many years to come.