Rapid technological advances have recently opened up new possibilities in understanding how the brain works. In particular the number of neurons that can be simultaneously recorded has increased considerably to hundreds (and soon thousands!) of neurons. This has lead to a big challenge on how to actually process and analyze the resulting big data sets. Conventional approaches often do not take advantage of big data sets and lack mathematical models to describe and connect them to cognitive functions. In this project we are working on solutions for these challenges using Open Data. This includes developing novel analysis methods and testing them with synthetic data, but also applying advanced data analysis and machine learning methods in combination with computational models to study cognitive processes.