The Neuroscience Information Framework: An Initiative of the NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research

Established in 2004, the NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research brings the 16 NIH Institutes, Centers and Offices that support neuroscience research into a collaborative framework to coordinate their ongoing efforts and to plan new cross-cutting initiatives. Working together, representatives from the partner Institutes, Centers, and Offices identify pervasive challenges in neuroscience and any technological barriers to solving them.

Early in their deliberations Blueprint representatives recognized that a framework for identifying, locating, relating, accessing, integrating, and analyzing information from the neuroscience research enterprise is critical to enhancing cooperative activities in the neurosciences. A Broad Agency Announcement was issued, and In, 2005 the Blueprint began support for a new initiative known as the "Neuroscience Information Framework" (NIF).