The Blue Brain project was launched in 2005 and aims to reverse engineer the mammalian brain from laboratory data.
Over the last 15 years, Professor Markram and his team have picked apart the structure of the neocortical column.
"It's a bit like going and cataloguing a bit of the rainforest - how may trees does it have, what shape are the trees, how many of each type of tree do we have, what is the position of the trees," he said.
"But it is a bit more than cataloguing because you have to describe and discover all the rules of communication, the rules of connectivity. "
The project now has a software model of "tens of thousands" of neurons - each one of which is different - which has allowed them to digitally construct an artificial neocortical column.
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For example, by pooling all the world's neuroscience data on animals - to create a "Noah's Ark", researchers may be able to build animal models.