According to Australian researchers, organoids, not quantum computers, could be the next big thing in computing.
Dr. Brett Kagan, chief scientist at Cortical Labs in Melbourne, and researchers from John Hopkins University want to spawn (pun intended) a new type of computer based on biology.
The team demonstrated how biocomputing devices could improve the performance/power ratio by several orders of magnitude by working together on a biological brain that learned to play Pong. They have already created small clusters of up to 50,000 human brain cells, which they call organoids (grown from stem cells in Petri dishes).
Intelligence of organoids
Their next goal is a 200x improvement (10 million neurons), which the authors believe is the minimum threshold for organoid intelligence, though this is still a long way from human brains (80 billion neurons or 8000x more). Now, just as with supercomputers and their thousands of GPUs and CPUs, several smaller so-called organoids could be combined to simulate a larger (mega?) brain.
While silicon-based supercomputers may soon match the raw performance of the average human brain (about one Exaflop), doing so may require the output of a small nuclear power station. The paper – published in Frontiers in Science – The differences in storage capacity, as well as the extensive meshing between neurons, all contribute to the human brain being a superior biological computer.
No, not the Matrix once more
Organoids have grown in popularity as a means of treating diseases over the last decade, but very few teams have considered them as building blocks for future computing devices.
To describe the use of brain-related cells in biocomputing, the group coined the term organoid intelligence (rather than brainoid intelligence). This is not the same as brain-computer interface work (Elon Musk’s Neuralink) or even Catalog’s DNA computer, but the work of these Australian scientists highlights the enormous gap that exists between silicon-based computing and whatever Nature produced.
“This new field of biocomputing promises unprecedented advances in computing speed, processing power, data efficiency, and storage capabilities – all while consuming less energy,” Dr. Kagan said.
“The open and collaborative spirit in which this collaboration was formed is particularly exciting. Bringing these various experts together is not only critical for success, but it also serves as a critical touch point for industry collaboration.”
The rise of organoids has raised several ethical concerns about their use. CNN spoke with several experts about artificial intelligence and consciousness as applied to organoids, and there appears to be a consensus that brain organoid systems could one day exhibit the premise of sentience, consciousness, and the type of general intelligence typically associated with humans.
“This emerging field must take a vigorous approach to address the ethical and moral issues that come with this type of scientific advancement, and it must do so before the technology crashes into the moral abyss,” one interviewee stated.
