View Watt Matters in AI<\/a>The brain: the world\u2019s most-efficient computing machine<\/p>\n\u201cThe brain has already solved many of the computational challenges we face,\u201d says Mayr. Chief among them all is energy efficiency. The brain is an extremely energy-efficient machine for processing information. To function, it uses as much as 20 watts of electricity, enough to power two LED light bulbs. Yet, with this small amount of power, a neuron can send 1,000 impulses per second. There are around 80 billion neurons in the human brain.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe brain is very good at deciding what synapses to put in \u2018power down\u2019 mode when. Moreover, once in power down, synapses also draw less power as compared to their counterparts in transistors,\u201d explains the professor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Taking inspiration from the brain\u2019s energy parsimony<\/p>\n
How close are we to matching the brain\u2019s efficiency? Mayr points to promising work at Google DeepMind, where researchers developed language models that, like the brain, activate only a tiny fraction of their neurons for each input. This brings AI closer to the brain\u2019s parsimony. But even then, hardware remains a stumbling block: today\u2019s chips cannot easily power down unused components the way the brain does.<\/p>\n
Mayr: \u201cAt the algorithm level, we are heading in the right direction. The challenge is actually building hardware that is good at doing nothing, that knows power-down modes down to the single processing element. Still, there is a lot of power that is being burned to power communications and memory, and switching down those components is challenging.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a recent study, the professor took part in, computing at the local level is already quite efficient. Restricting memory access, data movement, communication, and computation across the upper layers accounts for a significant portion of the power bill.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"Christian](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Christian_Mayr.jpg\")
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Christian Mayr <\/p>\n
Chair of Highly-Parallel VLSI-Systems and Neuromorphic Circuits at the Dresden University of Technology<\/p>\n
The professor has spent nearly three decades studying the way brain processes information. <\/p>\n
A sound, effective network\u00a0<\/p>\n
Another interesting feature of the brain, in contrast to modern AI computational systems, is its respect for physical limits. Basically, communication slows and weakens over distance. AI systems assume unlimited bandwidth and access to memory.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is one of the fallacies of machine learning algorithms, but that\u2019s not how a physical machine works,\u201d notes Mayr. \u201cBandwidth depends on how close the two ends are. The brain has a sound architecture to do so, and, even there, it is very parsimonious on how to communicate and where.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Running multiple processes simultaneously<\/p>\n
The brain is also adept at running multiple processes simultaneously. Consider, for instance, what happens when driving a car: the brain processes various sensory information, such as road signs, traffic noise, and the sensation of the road. All this data is continuously analyzed and used to make decisions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Interestingly, the brain rethinks all of its algorithms in an asynchronous fashion. Software developers and programmers typically design algorithms that operate in a serial, linear manner, repeating the same task over time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe human brain has many sub-processes running at the same time. As they occur simultaneously, all these tasks are interconnected and update each other in real-time. There is no need for the interlocking used in parallel computing. The brain has truly solved this problem,\u201d adds the professor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"3D](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1756702329_227_image\"\/)
Curbing AI energy use? 3D optical computing offers a solution<\/p>\n
Reducing power usage, yet boosting AI chip perfomance, Lumai’s 3D optical computing tech promises to curb AI energy use. <\/p>\n
Our brains will keep inspiring computing\u00a0<\/p>\n
What still fascinates the professor, after many years, is the difference between the way artificial and human brains work. \u201cFor instance, Chess and math are difficult for humans but easy for AI. Yet simple everyday tasks\u2014like a robot navigating a kitchen and making tea\u2014are effortless for us but still out of reach for machines,\u201d he adds.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite the hype around systems like ChatGPT, Mayr cautions against overstating their intelligence. \u201cThey\u2019re impressive, but what they\u2019re doing is closer to the lower levels of the brain\u2014pattern recognition and signal processing,\u201d he says. True human intelligence depends heavily on the associative cortex, which supports reasoning and symbolic thought. Replicating those higher-level processes, he believes, is still ahead of us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The decades of study on the human brain have unveiled its outstanding capabilities to process information, absorbing and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110137,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[64,63,257,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-110136","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-computing","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-computing","11":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}