Scientists Have Created A Chip Very Similar To The Human Brain - Alternative View

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Scientists Have Created A Chip Very Similar To The Human Brain - Alternative View
Scientists Have Created A Chip Very Similar To The Human Brain - Alternative View

Video: Scientists Have Created A Chip Very Similar To The Human Brain - Alternative View

Video: Scientists Have Created A Chip Very Similar To The Human Brain - Alternative View
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Despite the fact that we very often talk about artificial intelligence, there is one key difference in the structure of the human and machine brain - this is their structure. Neural networks built on neurons and on chips and transistors are not the same thing. However, a rather interesting discovery was made by scientists at the University of California, James Giemsevsky and Adam Stig. They, as the editorial office of phys.org reports, have created a chip that is very similar in structure to the human brain. And that might be the first step towards creating truly thinking machines.

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How to create an artificial brain

In collaboration with colleagues at Japan's National Institute of Materials Science, the team created an experimental device that demonstrated characteristics similar to certain types of brain "behavior" - learning, remembering, forgetting information, waking up and even sleeping.

The device, which the researchers created, is made of a "ball" of silver nanowires with an average diameter of only 360 nanometers. The nanowires were coated with an insulating polymer about 1 nanometer thick. In general, the device itself turned out to be 10 square millimeters in size.

Randomly assembled on a silicon wafer, nanowires have formed highly organized structures that are remarkably similar to those that form the neocortex, the part of the brain involved in higher functions such as language, perception, and cognition. One of the features that distinguishes a nanowire network from conventional electronic circuits is that electrons passing through them cause a change in the physical configuration of the network. During the study, an electric current caused silver atoms to migrate from the polymer coating and form new compounds. The system had about 10 million such connections, which are analogous to synapses through which brain cells connect and communicate.

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New chip device
New chip device

New chip device.

The researchers attached two electrodes to the resulting sample to test how the neural network worked. After the current flowed through the network, the connections between the nanowires were maintained for one minute, which resembled the learning and memorization process in the brain. In other cases, the connection was abruptly cut off after the end of the charge, imitating the "forgetting process."

In other experiments, the research team found that with less power consumption, the device exhibits behaviors similar to what neuroscientists see when they use functional MRI scans to take images of a sleeping person's brain. At higher power, the nanowire network behaved in the same way as the waking brain.

Because of their similarity to the inner workings of the brain, future devices based on nanowire technology could be extremely energy efficient. The human brain operates at a power roughly equivalent to that of a 20-watt incandescent lamp. In contrast, computer servers that run laborious tasks use hundreds of times more electricity.

Vladimir Kuznetsov