A new computer chip produced by scientists mimics the organisation of the human brain as it holds 1 million computational units called 'neurons', and has been described as a supercomputer the size of a postage stamp.
The design is the result of a long-running collaboration led by IBM, and is published in the journal Science.
Each neuron on the chip connects to 256 others and, using very little power, they can together pick out the key features in a visual scene in real time.
Dr Dharmendra Modha, the publication's author, told BBC News the processor was "a new machine for a new era".
"The cumulative total is over 200 person-years of work."
The chip crams more than 4,000 parallel cores onto a single chip – its previous attempt only managed one – and it only uses 70 milliwatts of energy, about the same as a hearing aid.
However, the chip - named TrueNorth - will take a while to be commercially useful, as programs need to be written from scratch to run on it.
WENN.com / 3 News
source: newshub archive
