A team of American scientists are working hard on designing and developing an artificial brain that would have human brain’s characteristics such as sensation, perception, action, interaction and cognition.
On one side of the team there are psychiatrists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, led by Professor Giulio Tononi. On the other side there are scientists from Columbia University and IBM, who are working on the software for the “cognitive computer”, and nanotechnology experts from Cornell, Stanford and University of California-Merced who will make the hardware.
Their aim is to create a machine which will be able to “think for itself” and do various logical tasks. Another interesting thing is that it will be as small as the human’s brain, and will work powered by just a hundret-watt light bulb.
“Our brains can do it, so we have proof that it is possible,” says Tononi.
Of course, it is impossible to replicate the whole human brain. “A lot of the work will be to determine what kinds of neurons are crucial and which ones we can do without,” Tononi said.
He said that the most important thing is to understand how to teach an artificial brain how to deal and learn from experience.
He also said that the artificial brain will be plastic, so it can change while it learns new things. The design will convey information using electrical impulses modeled on the spiking neurons found in mammal brains.
“It’s a very difficult task, but not impossible. I would be happy if we’d create a mouse brain. After that, it would be just a matter of time when we’d progress to more complex brains,” said Tononi.
The whole project is funded by a $4.9 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.