Friday, December 19, 2008

Computer scientist's holy grail?

For a long time we know that Resistor, Capacitor and Inductor form the basic elements. We also know to use a combination of these elements to create complex circuits.

Now make it four, add the newly created, but the 30 year old, "memristor"

Discovered as early as in the 70's, but got into the limelight after scientists from HP really made one. It is taking us to the nano age, really. It seems that the potential applications include "brain emulation".

Read more about it at spectrum and also wikipedia

Now, if you do not have time to read through the entire article, I want to quote the following paragraph from spectrum,

"... However, even a mouse brain simulation in real time involves solving an astronomical number of coupled partial differential equations. A digital computer capable of coping with this staggering workload would need to be the size of a small city, and powering it would require several dedicated nuclear power plants."

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