A Lego Toy That Solves Mazes May Bring New Hope to Amputees
Organic materials that enable computer chips to work like neurons could improve the usability of prosthesesA Lego toy robot with an organic brain, programmed to solve mazes, promises better prostheses: In the winter of 1997 Carver Mead lectured on an unusual topic for a computer scientist: the nervous systems of animals, such as the humble fly. Mead, a researcher at the California Institute of Technology, described his earlier idea for an electronic problem-solving system inspired by nerve cells, a technique he had dubbed “neuromorphic” computing. A quarter-century later, researchers have designed a carbon-based neuromorphic computing device—essentially an organic robot brain—that can learn to navigate a maze. Saugat Bolakhe, “Lego Robot with an Organic ‘Brain’ Learns to Navigate a Maze” at Scientific American (January 28, 2022) The difference between a regular materials-only computer chip made of Read More ›