New Brain-Like Computer May Solve World's Most Complex Math Problems

A new computer prototype called a "memcomputer" works by mimicking the human brain, and could one day perform notoriously complex tasks like breaking codes, scientists say. These new, brain-inspired computing devices also could help neuroscientists better understand the workings of the human brain, researchers say. In a conventional microchip, the processor, which executes computations, and the memory, which stores data, are separate components. In contrast, Massimiliano Di Ventra, a theoretical physicist at the University of California, San Diego, and his colleagues are building "memcomputers," made up of "memprocessors," that both process and store data. This setup mimics the neurons that make up the human brain, with each neuron serving as both the processor and the memory. The building blocks of memcomputers were first theoretically predicted in the 1970s, but they were manufactured for the first time in 2008.