IBM Brain In The Machine: A “Cognitive Milestone”

Neurosynaptic Cores This network of neurosynaptic cores is derived from wiring in the monkey brain.

IBM Research Almaden unveiled has the world’s grandest simulation of a brain, running on 96 supercomputers at Supercomputing 2012.  That’s half a trillion neurons and a hundred trillion synapses.

The initial goal of the project, code-named Compass, is far more ambitious than anything previously attempted, and actually features almost 10x as many neurons as there are in a human brain. Science News Daily called it a “cognitive milestone,” and Popular Science writes that IBM’s “cognitive computing program… just hit a major high.”

To do it, IBM used its cognitive computing chips unveiled last year.  They are designed to recreate the phenomena between spiking neurons and synapses. More than 2 billion of these cores were divided into 77 brain-inspired regions, with gray matter and white matter connectivity, according to IBM.

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For More Information:

• (New Yorker Nov 2012) The Brain In The Machine
• (Engadget Nov 2012) IBM Supercomputer Simulate 530 Billion Neurons and a Whole Lot of Synapses
• (Popsci Nov 2012) Simulated Brain Ramps Up to Include 100 Trillion Synapses
• (IBM Dec 2012) IBM’s 5 in 5:  Welcome To The Era of Cognitive Systems

–Posted by Julie Yamamoto, Program Manager, The Greater IBM Connection

 

IBM’s 5 in 5: Welcome To The Era of Cognitive Systems

On December 17th, 2012 IBM (NYSE: IBM) unveiled the seventh annual “IBM 5 in 5″ (#ibm5in5) – a list of innovations that have the potential to change the way people work, live and interact during the next five years. This year’s 5 in 5 are:

Touch: You will be able to touch through your phone (Story Map, Video, Blog Post)
Sight: A pixel will be worth a thousands words (Story Map, Video, Blog Post)
Hearing: Computers will hear what matters (Story Map, Video, Blog Post)
Taste: Digital taste buds will help you to eat smarter (Story Map, Video, Blog Post)
Smell: Computers will have a sense of smell (Story Map, Video, Blog Post)

The IBM 5 in 5 is based on market and societal trends as well as emerging technologies from IBM’s R&D labs around the world that can make these transformations possible.

–Posted by Julie Yamamoto, Program Manager, The Greater IBM Connection