IBM and American universities create a brain simulator
IBM Corporation, in collaboration with five American universities, is designing a new cognitive computer system that, according to its algorithm, will exactly resemble the human brain. The customer of the project is the Agency for Advanced Scientific Research DARPA, operating under the US Department of Defense.
IBM says that a team of engineers will try to recreate in electronic devices such brain functions as logical thinking, cognition, perception, sensation, interaction with the environment and behavioral reactions. Separately, the corporation says that the system being created will not be dozens of cabinets with computer nodes and superpowers, the creators intend to get a new architecture with low power consumption and compact dimensions.
"Our brain has an incomparable ability to integrate information from various sources and from different channels – vision, hearing, touch, smell, awareness of time and space, as well as the relationship of these factors. Now there are no computers that can even remotely reproduce the activity of the brain. A completely different approach is needed here," says Darmentra Modha, manager of a new cognitive project at IBM.
Nevertheless, the corporation says that now is the time to create systems that simulate the work of the brain. Firstly, neurologists have made significant progress in studying the processes of interaction of neurons, secondly, the power of modern processors already allows for calculations similar to brain processes in real time, and finally, thirdly, with the help of nanotechnology in the near future it will be possible to create an artificial brain in which everything will be simulated, up to a single nerve endings and neurons.
"By combining all these three trends, we can try to electronically simulate brain activity, although it is still hardly possible to create an electronic device comparable in size and function," IBM says.
The first phase of the project, during which scientists will design the algorithm of the future system, will last 9 months. At the moment, engineers already have software capable of simulating the "thinking" processes of small animals, such as mice and rats.
"In general, these issues are so complex that a very comprehensive approach is required to solve them. We are still at the initial stage of the puzzle," Modha notes.
Portal "Eternal youth" www.vechnayamolodost.ru20.11.2008