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Friday, August 3, 2018

What about using a sound based computer on Venus?

A conventional computer obviously represents many challenges on Venus:

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/a-clockwork-rover-for-venus

A Clockwork Rover for Venus

By avoiding electronics, a rover might be able to better explore Venus. The planet's hellish atmosphere creates pressures that would crush most submarines. Its average surface temperature is 864 degrees Fahrenheit (462 degrees Celsius), high enough to melt lead.

Mechanical computers have been used throughout history, most often as mathematical tools like adding machines.

Sauder said these analog technologies could help where electronics typically fail. In extreme environments like the surface of Venus, most electronics will melt in high temperatures or be corroded by sulfuric acid in the atmosphere.

"Venus is too inhospitable for kind of complex control systems you have on a Mars rover," Sauder said. "But with a fully mechanical rover, you might be able to survive as long as a year."


Maybe experimental computing could be another solution:

https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/faculty/engineering/news/sing-1.522909

"The solution to faster computing? Sing to your data.

Now a team from the Universities of Sheffield and Leeds may have found the answer to faster computing: sound. The research – published in Applied Physics Letters – has shown that certain types of sound waves can move data quickly, using minimal power.

Dr Tom Hayward from the University of Sheffield and Professor John Cunningham from the University of Leeds have together come up with a completely new solution: passing sound waves across the surface on which the wires are fixed. They also found that the direction of data flow depends on the pitch of the sound generated – in effect they “sang” to the data to move it.

The sound used is in the form of surface acoustic waves – the same as the most destructive wave that can emanate from an earthquake. Although already harnessed for use in electronics and other areas of engineering, this is the first time surface acoustic waves have been applied to a data storage system.

Dr Hayward, from our Department of Materials Science and Engineering, said: “The key advantage of surface acoustic waves in this application is their ability to travel up to several centimetres without decaying, which at the nano-scale is a huge distance. Because of this, we think a single sound wave could be used to “sing” to large numbers of nanowires simultaneously, enabling us to move a lot of data using very little power. We’re now aiming to create prototype devices in which this concept can be fully tested."



Submitted August 03, 2018 at 04:11PM by Tidemand https://ift.tt/2OJcevk

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