The CRC 936 has leveraged key scientific domains like neuroimaging, neurophysiology from the macroscopic to the microscopic scale, neuropsychology, neurology, psychiatry, and computational neuroscience. Using synergies between these domains, a continuous and highly productive workflow in the consortium has produced a wealth of results on large-scale brain networks, on structural and functional connectivity, on network modulation and on network models throughout the three funding periods.

The results obtained in the three funding periods have given rise to a considerable number of publications. In the first funding period, a total of 112 papers have been published in peer-reviewed journals. In the second funding phase, 134 papers were published. In the third funding phase, 233 papers have been published. For many of the projects, the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly impeded the acquisition of new experimental data as a result of laboratory shutdowns. Yet, substantial publication output could be achieved in these projects during the third funding period based on data acquired before onset of the pandemic and also by running additional analyses on already available rich datasets.

The sharing and joint development of methodological approaches and the focus on common research themes has successfully established close links both within and across the thematic areas of the CRC, as shown by the large number of publications reflecting cooperations across projects. A visualization of the high number of these successful collaborations is shown in the figure, which displays the dense network of collaborations as a “spring force” model with projects as nodes and the numbers of joint papers as edges of the network. On average, about one-third of all publications emerged from cooperations between CRC projects (43 in the first, 45 in the second and 70 in the third funding period).