Probabilistic Chip A chip that is designed to be flawed

[Galahad 0]

I did a search on the forums, but didn't find anything on the subject... If in fact there is such a topic, I will kindly ask the moderators to delete this topic... And now, off to the world of uncertainty

What is a probability chip? There isn't enough space here, and I don't have that amount of time and knowledge, to pass on what exactly that is, but I will try to, in few short words...

In todays world, every house appliance has some soert of a microchip inside it, that runs it, practically everything that runs on electricity, has a microchip... The way todays microchips are created, they perform double check and double checks upon double checks, to make sure that each bit is either a 0 or a 1... This requires a lot of electricity, and in turn creates a lot of heat, that could damage a microchip... Professor Krishna Palem of the Rice University in the USA, is the one to "blame" for these microprocessors... He theorised that we could actually turn uncertainty into an asset, not a flaw... Professor Palem has actually created a prototype chip, that consumed about 20% less power than conventional chips...

He also claims that Google is a great example of how probabilistic chips would work... He provided a rather long list of stuff that doesn'y need that big precission in it's computing, rangin from CAD aplications, over digital signal processing, database searches, and even financial analysis...

These probabilistic chips would actually be most usefull in mobile and embedded devices, where high precision is not a requirement... Why use number 9 in 26.359, for example?

One of the other things professor Palem says his probabilistic chips would be omst usefull, is in prosthetic aids, and thus help in vision and hearing impairments in humans...

IBM and Intel are receiving regular updates from professor Palem, and there are also rumours that some Wall Street companies are interested in thus probabilistic chips...

So, I guess in some time, my cell phones' battery won't die in 2 days, but rather in 7 or 14... That would be great, and hopefully, it will be doable...

Since this is a rather fresh and interesting topic, you can find professor Palems' publications on his personal website, here

What is your oppinion on this? Have you heard of these chips?