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Phoenix666 writes:

As the cost of sequencing a person's genome plummets, demand for the computing power needed to make sense of the genetic information is growing. Nicholas New hopes some of it will be worked on by a processor that parses data using laser light, built by his U.K. startup, Optalysys.

New says his company's exotic approach to crunching data can dramatically upgrade a conventional computer by taking over some of the most demanding work in applications such as genomics and simulating weather. "The grunt work can be done by the optics," he says.

Researchers have worked on the idea of using optics rather than electronics to process data for decades, with little commercial traction. But New argues that it is now needed because manufacturers such as Intel admit that they can't keep improving conventional chips at the pace they used to

takyon: Optalysys is a company that claims it will scale to petaflops and exaflops in the near future using desktop amounts of power. However, their technology has been described as a coprocessor so it isn't clear what kind of operations it can perform. Much has been made of its partnership with The Genome Analysis Center (TGAC).

The article also mentions LightOn, which published this paper. Optical and quantum computing are both being examined for their potential to enhance machine learning. Google is researching the quantum approach.

Original Submission

1. "Phoenix666" - https://soylentnews.org/~Phoenix666/
2. "plummets" - https://www.technologyreview.com/s/427720/bases-to-bytes/
3. "a processor that parses data using laser light" - https://www.technologyreview.com/s/602765/computing-with-lasers-could-power-up-genomics-and-ai/
4. "Optalysys" - http://optalysys.com/
5. "scale to petaflops and exaflops" - https://www.hpcwire.com/2014/08/06/exascale-breakthrough-weve-waiting/
6. "described as a coprocessor" - http://insidehpc.com/2016/04/optical-processing-pioneer-wins-project-with-the-us-defence-advanced-research-projects-agency-darpa/
7. "partnership with The Genome Analysis Center" - https://www.nextplatform.com/2015/03/25/a-light-approach-to-genomics-with-optical-processors/
8. "LightOn" - http://www.lighton.io/
9. "this paper" - https://arxiv.org/pdf/1510.06664v2.pdf
10. "the quantum approach" - http://research.google.com/pubs/QuantumAI.html
11. "Original Submission" - https://soylentnews.org/submit.pl?op=viewsub&subid=16762

printed from SoylentNews, Computing With Lasers Could Power Up Genomics and AI on 2024-04-23 11:26:55