Tag Archives: IBM

IBM doesn’t call it a brain chip

Impact: Artificial Intelligence    August 22, 2011
IBM calls it a neural core, not a ‘brain chip’ or a ‘thinking chip.’ The recently announced development involves two prototype chips that contain circuitry inspired by biological components of the brain – neurons, synapses and axons. The chips are the earliest building blocks of what IBM hopes to develop into a more complete system [...]
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Supercomputer race: Japan’s Fujitsu takes the lead

News: Computer Power    June 21, 2011
The bragging rights for building the world’s fastest supercomputer pass to Japan and Fujitsu’s K-supercomputer. For most people this is a fleeting tidbit of technology news, but it is one kind of milestone marking the increasing power of computers. For the computer industries in the countries involved, it is a rather big deal. In this [...]
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Graphene ICs: IBM builds graphene transistors into a circuit

Impact: Computer Power    June 17, 2011
About one week before IBM celebrated its 100th year, IBM researchers published in the journal Science [10 June 2011, paywalled, Wafer-Scale Graphene Integrated Circuit] and publicly announced the design of a high speed graphene circuit. Since there are announcements about this or that new application of graphene just about every week, it would be easy [...]
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IBM at 100

Impact: Computer Power    June 16, 2011
Today (June 16, 2011) is the 100th birthday of IBM. There will be parties, almost all of them provided by IBM for employees. I suppose a few competitors, past and present will raise a thought for IBM. I’ve seen a few articles about IBM’s 100th in prominent publications. A few bloggers will have their say. [...]
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Update: Who’s afraid of Watson?

Impact: Artificial Intelligence    March 8, 2011
Not long ago a computer assembled by IBM, named Watson, whupped a couple of good-old-boys and all-time-winners at the game of Jeopardy! This garnered a good deal of attention, mainly with the notion that computers are becoming as smart as people. No, I said, in an essay titled “Who’s afraid of Watson?” [SciTechStory: Who’s afraid [...]
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Who’s afraid of Watson?

Essay: February 19, 2011
And the answer is, “What is Watson?” Even if you know the correct reference (pick from: Alexander Graham Bell’s assistant, a computer, the founder of IBM), which by far most people on this planet do not, it’s unlikely that fear is attached to it. Watson is not a common synonym for boogeyman. However, a few [...]
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Pulsed scanning tunneling microscope: New tool, new insights

Impact: Scientific Instruments    October 3, 2010
An STM image of atoms forming a “quantum corral”….image developed for IBM. Before the week goes flipping by on the calendar, I wanted to mark one of those achievements that get scant attention but will probably have large impact. I say “probably” because even the people who developed IBM’s new pulsed scanning tunneling microscope don’t [...]
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Graphene in a communications context

News: Communications    April 11, 2010
News stories about using graphene in computers appear all the time. Less often, there are stories about graphene used in communications. This will probably change. Graphene is carbon, a specific form of carbon related to graphite (as in the lead of pencils). Graphene is graphite in sheets, very thin sheets precisely one carbon atom thick. [...]
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Graphene transistors

News: Computer Power    February 5, 2010
Start with the fact that digital computers run on transistors; transistors are key. Next, consider graphene, the nanotechnology cousin of graphite, a versatile material that has hit the news many times in the past several years. Finally, with regard to transistors and computers, graphene has already been dubbed the ‘successor to silicon’; now it looks [...]
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Update: IBM Cortical Simulator

Impact: Neuro-intelligence    November 23, 2009
For an excellent critical take on the IBM Cortical Simulator achieving ‘the intelligence of a cat’, read Jonah Lehrer’s Blog. Essential Quote: In the coming years, there will be many grand announcements about supercomputers that attempt to imitate the machinery inside the skull. One way to distinguish between such claims is to look at their [...]
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IBM Cortical Simulator – more brain than a cat

News: Computer Power    November 20, 2009
Modeling brain function with a supercomputer is an ongoing scientific project, now spanning decades. Of course, as the computers become increasingly powerful, the results begin to look more realistic – and that creates a paradox…
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