Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 7.5 Scheme of a biomolecular signal inverter
The authors of the concept themselves point out that the rate of functioning of
the biochemical digital devices should be small. And so it is unlikely they can be
used to solve the problems of high computational complexity. Nevertheless, they
believe that the principal possibility to create large supramolecular systems with a
given structure opens up new avenues in molecular engineering. Thus, the main
publication describing the principles and design techniques of amorphous comput-
ing ends with the words:
“On the whole, we are in the primitive stage of the development of cell and
amorphous computing analogous to the early stages of electronics in the beginning
of the 20th century. The further development will open new boundaries of engi-
neering, which will dominate in information technologies of the next century
”
...
7.2 Semiconductor Reaction-Diffusion Devices: The First
Attempts
Autowave processes in chemical reaction-diffusion systems (not to mention the
biological ones) are much slower than the same processes in solid-state semicon-
ductor media. And, despite the fact that the speed of the chemical media is sufficient
for solving many practical problems, in recent years attempts were made to create
solid-state autowave systems. One of the first experimental works was carried out
by the Soviet physicists L. L. Golikov, V. N. Nemenuschi, M. I. Elinson, and
Y. Balkarei back in 1981.
They used the plates of the ferroelectric crystal (triglycine sulfate) at a temper-
ature slightly below the Curie temperature of the ferroelectric. The voltage applied
to the electrodes on the plates of the ferroelectric with a frequency of 10
3
-10
5
Hz
causes the medium to heat. Theoretical estimates show that in this system, station-
ary states at three different temperatures
T
1
<
T
3
may arise. Two of them (
T
1
and
T
3
) are stable, and one (
T
2
) is unstable. Initially the medium is in one of the
T
2
<
