Center for Brains, Minds and Machines

What Center for Brains, Minds and Machines does

The Center for Brains, Minds and Machines (CBMM) was a multi-institutional National Science Foundation Science and Technology Center established in 2013 and headquartered at MIT, with Harvard University as managing partner. The center's mission was to create a new interdisciplinary field — the Science and Engineering of Intelligence — by bringing together computer scientists, cognitive scientists, and neuroscientists to study how the brain produces intelligent behavior and how intelligence might be replicated in machines. CBMM operated four interconnected research modules: the Visual Stream module (hierarchical models of ventral visual stream processing from HMAX to deep learning), the Brain OS module (visual routines, memory, and executive function during cortical processing), the Cognitive Core module (intuitive physics, geometry, and social cognition representations), and the Symbolic Compositional Models module (abstract reasoning, language acquisition, and long-range planning).

CBMM's technology stack was rooted in computational neuroscience rather than commercial AI product development. The center produced CBMM Memos, peer-reviewed publications, open-source code and datasets on GitHub, and an extensive video archive of seminars and lectures. Its educational distribution channels included the annual three-week Brains, Minds and Machines Summer Course at MBL Woods Hole, the Science of Intelligence Learning Hub online platform, K-12 teacher workshops, and undergraduate summer research internships. CBMM did not sell products or services; its operations were funded entirely through the $25 million NSF STC grant and supplemental institutional support.

The center concluded operations in 2025 after its 12-year NSF funding horizon, with research activities continuing through the Poggio Lab at MIT and the Institute on Intelligence at MIT and Harvard — the latter institutionalizing CBMM's interdisciplinary research agenda beyond the center's own organizational structure.

Name

Center for Brains, Minds and Machines

Legal name

Center for Brains, Minds and Machines

Website

https://cbmm.mit.edu

Company type

Private

Founded year

2013

Operating status

Closed

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

The Center for Brains, Minds and Machines (CBMM) was an NSF-funded multi-institutional research center (2013-2025) headquartered at MIT that studied intelligence through computational neuroscience, cognitive science, and computer science. It served the academic research community via four research modules, a summer course, and open educational platforms.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Computational Neuroscience Research

NAICS

Computer Training (611420), Educational Support Services (61171)

akta.pro primary industry

AI & Machine Learning (Foundations & Applied) (EDAMACAG)

akta.pro secondary industries

Game-Based CS & Computational Thinking Platforms (EDAFANAD), Computer Science Theory (Computational Thinking, Logic, Discrete Math) (EDAMACAK)

Keywords

• Computational neuroscience research
• Intelligence research center
• Deep learning research
• Machine intelligence education
• Brain cognition studies

Headquarters

HQ city

Cambridge

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Infrastructure

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

The Center for Brains, Minds and Machines is an NSF-funded multi-institutional research center that conducts interdisciplinary research on the science and engineering of intelligence, integrating computer science, neuroscience, and cognitive science. It delivers educational programs including a 3-week immersive Summer Course at MBL Woods Hole, the online Science of Intelligence Learning Hub, and an extensive video archive of seminars and lectures. The center also publishes research outputs through CBMM Memos and peer-reviewed publications.

Product overview

The Center for Brains, Minds and Machines (CBMM) is a multi-institutional NSF Science and Technology Center dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of intelligence. The center operates a modular research architecture consisting of four interconnected research modules: Visual Stream (Module 1) studying hierarchical visual processing models; Memory and Executive Function | Brain OS (Module 2) investigating visual routines and perceptual intelligence; The Cognitive Core (Module 3) examining intuitive physics, geometry, and psychology; and Symbolic Compositional Models (Module 4) exploring symbolic reasoning and abstract cognition. Beyond research, CBMM offers educational programs including the Brains, Minds, and Machines Summer Course (an immersive 3-week program at MBL Woods Hole), the Science of Intelligence Learning Hub (online educational platform), an extensive video archive of seminars and lectures, and the CBMM Memos publication series. The center operated from 2013 to 2025 and continues research through the Poggio Lab at MIT.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Brains, Minds, and Machines Summer Course: An intensive three-week course providing a deep introduction to the problem of intelligence, combining computation, neuroscience, and cognition
• Science of Intelligence Learning Hub
• #TeachMeSomething

Products and services

• Visual Stream (Module 1) Research module focusing on the stream of visual information processing from the ventral visual areas, combining hierarchical models (from HMAX to deep learning) with experiments in humans and monkeys to understand ventral stream computations of intelligent vision.
• Memory and Executive Function | Brain OS (Module 2) Research module investigating visual routines and computations during post-150ms visual processing, modeling the brain's operating system with components for scene interpretation, eye movement planning, and perceptual intelligence.
• The Cognitive Core (Module 3) Research module studying the cognitive core including representations for scene layout, intuitive physics, and psychology that enable judgment of physical and social dynamics and action planning.
• Symbolic Compositional Models (Module 4) Research module exploring higher-level symbolic processes for abstract visual understanding, language acquisition, concept creation, logical reasoning, and long-range planning across images, language, and video.
• Brains, Minds, and Machines Summer Course An immersive 3-week intensive course held at MBL Woods Hole, MA providing a broad introduction to human and machine intelligence research, combining computation, neuroscience, and cognition disciplines for graduate students and researchers.
• Science of Intelligence Learning Hub Online platform offering lectures, tutorials, and courses on intelligence science with modeling and data analysis tools for neuroscience, cognitive science, and AI research.
• CBMM Video Archive Extensive video library of CBMM seminars, lectures, presentations, and #TeachMeSomething series covering intelligence research, neuroscience, and AI topics.
• CBMM Memos Research memorandum series documenting CBMM research findings and theoretical frameworks on intelligence and learning.

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability7 records

Feature5 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Broad incumbents

• DeepMind: Leading industrial AI research lab. Comparable as a deep-learning research organization publishing foundational work on intelligence, though commercially driven and orders of magnitude larger than CBMM.
• MIT CSAIL: MIT's flagship computer science and AI laboratory. Directly comparable as the host-institution peer that continues much of CBMM-adjacent AI, vision, and robotics research and serves as a natural landing site for CBMM alumni.
• Allen Institute for AI (AI2): Philanthropically-funded AI research institute. Comparable as a non-university, mission-driven research organization producing open AI research, though with broader AI scope than CBMM's biology-of-intelligence focus.
• Mila (Quebec AI Institute): Large academic AI research consortium led by Yoshua Bengio. Comparable as a multi-institutional AI research hub with deep learning focus, though broader in industrial application than CBMM's biologically-grounded mission.
• Stanford HAI (Human-Centered AI Institute): Stanford's cross-disciplinary AI institute researching intelligence, cognition, and societal impact. Comparable as a peer institution studying AI and intelligence through interdisciplinary lenses, and one of CBMM's collaborator universities.

Direct peers

• Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit (UCL): UCL's theoretical neuroscience and machine learning unit. Directly comparable to CBMM's computational neuroscience thrust, with shared focus on biologically-plausible learning and theoretical frameworks for intelligence.
• Flatiron Institute Center for Computational Neuroscience (Simons Foundation): Simons Foundation's computational neuroscience research center. Directly comparable as a well-funded, focused research entity studying the computational principles of intelligence, with analogous publication and training mission.
• Redwood Center for Theoretical Neuroscience (UC Berkeley): Berkeley's theoretical neuroscience center studying neural computation and learning. Comparable research mission on understanding biological intelligence through computational models, with a smaller academic footprint similar to CBMM.
• Kempner Institute at Harvard University: Harvard's institute studying the computational basis of intelligence and biological learning. Closest direct peer given shared mission, multi-institutional collaboration history with CBMM, and overlap in studying natural and artificial intelligence.
• Princeton Neuroscience Institute: Princeton's interdisciplinary neuroscience research institute. Comparable as an academic research entity combining neuroscience and computational approaches to intelligence, with a similar training and research output model.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/MIT_CBMM
• YouTubeyoutube.com/channel/UCGoxKRfTs0jQP52cfHCyyRQ
• Facebookfacebook.com/CBMM.NSF.STC
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/mit-cbmm

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles10 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Center for Brains, Minds and Machines