China Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 IBM unveils computer fed by 'electronic blood' IBM has unveiled a prototype of a new brain-inspired computer powered by what it calls "electronic blood". The firm says it is learning from nature by building computers fuelled and cooled by a liquid, like our minds. The human brain packs phenomenal computing power into a tiny space and uses only 20 watts of energy - an efficiency IBM is keen to match. Its new "redox flow" system pumps an electrolyte "blood" through a computer, carrying power in and taking heat out. A very basic model was demonstrated this week at the technology giant's Zurich lab by Dr Patrick Ruch and Dr Bruno Michel. Their vision is that by 2060, a one petaflop computer that would fill half a football field today, will fit on your desktop. "We want to fit a supercomputer inside a sugarcube. To do that, we need a paradigm shift in electronics - we need to be motivated by our brain," says Michel. "The human brain is 10,000 times more dense and efficient than any computer today. "That's possible because it uses only one - extremely efficient - network of capillaries and blood vessels to transport heat and energy - all at the same time." ... "The computer industry uses $30bn of energy and throws it out of the window. We're creating hot air for $30bn," says Michel. "Ninety-nine per cent of a computer's volume is devoted to cooling and powering. Only 1% is used to process information. And we think we've built a good computer?" "The brain uses 40% of its volume for functional performance - and only 10% for energy and cooling." Michel's vision is for a new "bionic" computing architecture, inspired by one of the laws of nature - allometric scaling - where an animal's metabolic power increases with its body size. Click on the link for the full article Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellis Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 a super computer the size of a sugar cube? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elessar78 Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 awesome. love it when I read stuff like this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corcaigh Posted October 21, 2013 Share Posted October 21, 2013 Ry Kurzweil aggregates cool stories like this in a daily newsletter. It really provides a snapshot of the wonder of human ingenuity. Instead of reading any of the largely irrelevant **** covered on mainstream news, it's a great way to start the morning. Today features the story in the OP and some others on applications of IBM's Watson computer, a scientific definition of consciousness, using Kinect to help the blind enjoy yoga, data mining dreams, and more http://www.kurzweilai.net/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueinBuf Posted October 22, 2013 Share Posted October 22, 2013 My company built some of IBM's most recent supercomputers "Blue Gene Q" I hope we can somehow get involved in this project also. I believe Watson is their "Blue Gene P" system, built that also, Q is a million times more impressive. Here's a wiki article on the systems http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_gene Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.