Restoring Active Memory (RAM)

"The Restoring Active Memory (RAM) program aims to mitigate the effects of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in military Service members by developing neurotechnologies to facilitate memory formation and recall in the injured brain. More than 270,000 Service members have been diagnosed with TBI since 20001. The condition frequently results in an impaired ability to retrieve memories formed prior to injury and a reduced capacity to form or retain new memories following injury. Despite the scale of the problem, few effective therapies currently exist to mitigate the long-term consequences of TBI on memory. Enabling restoration of memory function would support military readiness by providing injured personnel the option of returning to duty, and would improve quality of life for wounded veterans. DARPA's end goal for the RAM program is to develop and test a wireless, fully implantable neural interface for human clinical use. To achieve that goal, the program blends fundamental research and technology development. Performer teams are building multi-scale computational models with high spatial and temporal resolution that describe how neurons code declarative memories-the well-defined parcels of knowledge that can be consciously recalled and described in words, such as events, times, and places. Teams are also exploring new methods for analyzing and decoding neural signals to understand how targeted stimulation might be applied to help restore function to the injured brain."

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