3.2. Count on atoms - the computer of the future

Computer, it is said, penetrates into ever more areas of life. But: Did not swallow so far still nobody a computer and inadvertently inhaled also.

In few years that will be able to occur. " if it then with you between the teeth knirscht, then that does not have sand, but then it can be a microcomputer ", says Randy Katz, a hagerer man from California, who holds after " wild ideas and completely crazy beginnings " look out, if it applies to invent the computer of the future.

Randy Katz, in whose office with mountains of manuscripts a crowd of multicolored putting figures and a selection of chip bags associate, is a professor at the American elite University of Berkeley and director/conductor of a group of researchers, which gave itself the name " Endeavour expedition ".

An aim of research of the computer pioneers: They want to let the computer shrink on a Kubikmillimeter ­ the size of a pinhead or a middle sandkorns.

" Smart Dust ", smart dust, call the researchers, which ripens there in its laboratories and is at the end to be still further reduced (up to mass of 1 time 0.1 millimeters).

Whole clouds of these minicomputers, so the vision, become mankind in the future umwabern. The Winzlinge can organize itself, communicate together and transfer data. Additionally they are qualified to count and to form all re-clamping network: the Omninet ­ even, as if good old Internet would transform into a thick layer fog, which puts over the civilization.

The eloquente Berkeley professor is used to it to react to puzzling views of its listeners who can follow its concept only laboriously. To the illustration it has itself in, as it finds positioned, simple example, how its dust grain processors could be used " in few years ": Katz promises its public the end of colds by air conditioning systems.

" seats I alone in my office, the air condition too much cold air pustet into the space. If I have attendance, it fast too warm ", describes the professor. In the future however smart dust, finely sputtered in the room air, with its sensors the respective ambient temperature and the number of the present persons to detect. The data were transmitted to a central computer, which adjusts the air conditioning system then after the preferences of the present ones stored before.

For the first stage of development of the planned Omninet the necessary components are already available, insure Katz. " high speed computer chips, wireless communication and sensor technology ­ everything already available. "

First prototypes of the miniaturized computer generation already developed. They have a diameter of five millimeters and in a plain building block are directly next door manufactured, which is shared sinnigerweise of the architecture of old large computers. Smart Dust does not stand any house dust when its production. Therefore Kris Pister, professor for computer science, and its student team in the schummrigen yellow light of a pure space operate.

With a breath-thin laser beam they burn the circuits of their microcomputers into sparkling silicon wafers. A corrosive saeurebad opens afterwards the chip structure. Then difficult joining of the individual components begins.

With the peace of a uhrmachers board Warneke bends itself over the eyepieces of a mikromanipulators, a type work bench with integrated microscope. The graduate student positions computer-controlled grab arms, which the individual parts of the five-millimeter computer maneuver gradually in the target. " a conductive epoxy adhesive holds the components fixed together ", says Warneke.

© the MIRROR

Under the microscope the construction way of the processor particle becomes visible, " an architecture, which is determined by the lack at workstation and of energy ", so professor Pister. The foundation forms a rectangular battery, which is enormous on board the smart shuttle in relation to the actual technique.

The surface of the current memory is covered to the half by a solar cell. On the other half the brain of the smart pellet, a silicon chip from own production sticks. At the moment its efficiency is still badly limited. " the Warneke the limitation justifies more arithmetic operations, the more highly the energy consumption ".

Another Stromfresser is installed onto the chip: the optical transmission unit of the dust grain.

Each megabit, which will transfer by air, costs energy. In order to save current, the Endeavour team decided against a datentransfer by means of radiowellen, how it the mobile telephone practices. " instead the particles over laser beams " communicate, explain Pister. The saving is considerable: The transfer of a megabit needs thereby only ten micro joules per second ­ a six-millionth of the energy, which uses a 60-Watt-Gluehbirne in same time.

The optical transfer principle between the microcomputers resembles from Morsezeichen, which zublinken themselves ships with a strong lamp. According to the digital code 0 and 1 transfers the laser the statuses " on " and " out ". A tiny laser diode on the upper deck of the particle sends the light signals. That is returned by a mirror in the direction of a second dust grain; at the target the flash falls on a photodiode, which converts it again into an electrical impulse.

For the contact the communication particle to the ground station could the Tueftler from Berkeley a further current savings trick be broken in: Not the smart dust must loose-send a laser beam, in order to dispatch a message, but the ground station.

But Bryan Atwood, in the team responsible for the transfer unit, developed a cubic reflector with reflected insides, which can be moved over tiny hinges. " so Smart Dust with minimum energy expenditure can manufacture a data impulse ", says Atwood.

For the first acid test of its data mirror Atwood, a test model crawled unterm to lever, on the roof of the institute. Warneke structured meanwhile on a opposite tennis court the slave station. " the laser could actually make a connection ", reports Atwood. Technically it is even possible to send the jet of Berkeley over San Francisco Bay ­ 21 kilometers far.  

With the help of laser communication of the Smart Dust, according to type of a termite state, is to develop such a thing like sense of community in the peripheral computer units. The dust grains converse together and organize themselves to an intelligent swarm. " on the computer chip we will install in addition a software, which consists Endeavour Expeditionsleiter Katz of learning algorithms ", says.

The researchers want to also give only the most important vital functions to the smart dust on the way: a current supply, a minicomputer, the communication hardware and the software for the communication. Everything else are to learn the Siliziumwinzlinge after the will of the programmers ­ like humans ­ from experiences, which store them, recall and to exchange among themselves. Thus they adapt gradually to their environment and can take over certain functions.

 The adaptability of the system is to be achieved with a flexible
 computer architecture. Conventional processors possess a rigid
 structure, their circuits are firmly created on the chip. Future
 computers, so also the smart dust, are to order against it over
 reconfigurable arithmetic and logic units so mentioned: The circuits
 resemble a chessboard, with which each individual field consists of a
 computer and a memory unit. 

 Depending upon application the thinking units interconnect
 themselves again, independently, without a computer engineer at
 the system would have to screw or input a programmer new
 computing instruction. " the difference between software and
 hardware ", Randy Katz explains, " will stop to exist. " 

 Model for such systems, which move in the direction of an artificial
 intelligence, must be after Katz's ' opinion nature. " the high-complex
 information network factories from tomorrow form an electronic
 ecological system ", say the professor. Such flexible, organizing
 systems are a little susceptibly to errors and extremely durable. Tiny
 supercomputers will form billions of networks and life-similar
 communities. " the old boundaries between nature and technique
 resolve themselves ", say Katz. 

 Only quite even if the smart dust grains get still legs. On it Richard
 Yeh. operates on the mikromanipulator folds it from breath-fine
 silicon wafers small Beinchen with joints in the Pister group. This form
 of micromechanical Origami permits a lateral course, " similarly that of
 a cancer ", to the Smart Dust thus Yeh. 

 Like already with the Internet there is a high interest in the Smart
 Dust development also that of military. The pentagon pumps three
 million Marks of Foerdergelder to the Berkeley project. With the
 inconspicuous dust particles, so hope, could be operated elegantly
 espionage behind the hostile lines; Smart Dust could seek out
 opposing tanks and ensure that they are lamely put. 

 The actual area of operations sees the Pister troop however in the
 civilian life. Smart dust forms an almost invisible communication
 infrastructure. In the atmosphere suspended, weather or traffic
 could observe the dust particle. The computer researchers in
 Berkeley want to equip each conceivable electronic device with a
 microcomputer, which seeks out defects, before they occur, and
 preventing alarms the service. 

 In the dwelling the particles register each occurring person, stop
 implement, office armchair and air conditioning system suitably.
 Smart dust at the finger crests erspuert the movement of the hand.
 " so one could, however by moving the hand, texts write, draw or
 sculptures formed ", plan Kris Pister. 

 Of course one can also instruct to the smart dust to call a friend to
 throw or fast find a lecture foil out to the wall, where there is a
 Pizza to order still around midnight. He will ask around on the place in
 the Omninet. 

 " the future is a world from communicating machines ", says to one
 the most important Vordenker silicone of the Valley, Paul Saffo: "
 machines will communicate to well-being of humans with machines. A
 half per cent of information exchange will only take place directly
 between humans. " 

 At the network of the future engineers and computer scientists in
 Berkeley do not only knit. The large US computer companies such as
 IBM, Microsoft and Sun support a not less ambitious project at the
 Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which carries the name by
 program " Oxygen ", oxygen, in equal parts. 

 Heart is a technical Jack of all trades named Handy 21, a type mobile
 telephone, which is equipped with a reconfigurable computer chip.
 With it it speaks among other things several foreign languages. 

 Michael Dertouzos, it lacks the director/conductor of the Oxygen
 project, not fantasy: " you sit in Paris and want to call a friend in
 America ", told it recently the being astonished users of a computer
 conference. " then you speak simply in the Handy 21: ' contact Joe '.
 " 

 All further one completes the machine: It receives from a virtual
 servant in Joes office that it is on a meeting in Boston, into which
 Handy 21 immediately latches itself. " microcomputers in the walls of
 the Bostoner of conference room register an opened room door. A
 signal that Handy 21 can through-place Dertouzos to Joe ", doziert.
 Joe can be able to be come now from its own Handy documents for
 the telephone call or the device ask to seek out two further users
 for a telefonkonferenz. 

 Oxygen is everywhere. Future networks, however they are then
 called, will have evaporated into air. Information stream are only
 measured in quantity of data per cubic meter. The successors of the
 Internet technique will possess an active independent existence, but
 no switching switching. 

 But the networks will throw long data shadows. Over each humans
 they collect enormous information capacities, are it in the form of
 videoaufzeichnungen and movement profiles or over his consumer
 behaviour. The mental fathers of the Superkommunikatoren belong to
 that sort of American research optimists, who worry the little.
 Against risks and side effects they have always a refined idea. "
 parallel to the development of all-global networks develop for
 encoding procedures, with which sensitive data will be protected
 against other access ", believe Katz. 

 Also Pister is a pragmatic type and thinks of the practical
 consequences of its invention: No, neither with a dramatic increase
 of breath way illnesses still with new forms by house dust allergy is
 to be counted. 

 " who should themselves make inhaliert, in this point however no
 concerns for smart dust ", calms down Pister its listeners: " one
 output-coughs with a diameter of a millimeter such a particle easily.
 " 

GERALD TRAUFETTER