| Amorphous and Cellular Computing (1998) | |||||||||||
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Abstract | |||||||||||
| The objective of this research is to create the architectural, algorithmic, and technological foundations for exploiting programmable materials. These are materials that incorporate vast numbers of programmable elements that react to each other and to their environment. Such materials can be fabricated economically, provided that the computing elements are amassed in bulk without arranging for precision interconnect and testing. In order to exploit programmable materials we must identify engineering principles for organizing and instructing myriad programmable entities to cooperate to robustly achieve pre-established goals, even though the individual entities are unreliable and interconnected in unknown, irregular, and time-varying ways. Progress in microfabrication and in bioengineering will make it possible to assemble such amorphous systems at almost no cost, provided that (1) the units need not all work correctly; (2) the units are identically programmed; and (3) there is no need to manufacture precise geometrical arrangements of the units or precise interconnections among them. | |||||||||||
Details der Publikation | |||||||||||
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