Inside a research lab nestled in the scenic Swiss town of Vevey, scientists are keeping small clusters of human brain cells alive in a nutrient-rich solution — not for medical study, but to power computers. These “mini-brains” must remain healthy at all times, as they serve as living computer processors and unlike laptops or servers, once they die, there’s no restarting them. The emerging field, known as biocomputing or “wetware,” seeks to tap into the extraordinary and still largely mysterious computing potential of the human brain. During a tour of the Swiss start-up FinalSpark, co-founder Fred Jordan told AFP that he envisions a future where biological processors replace the silicon chips driving today’s artificial intelligence revolution. Currently, the supercomputers that power AI systems like ChatGPT rely on semiconductor chips designed to imitate neurons and brain networks. “Instead of mimicking the brain, why not use the real thing?” Jordan said. One of the biggest promises of biocomputing lies in its energy efficiency. As AI’s growing power demands strain energy grids and push emissions higher, biological processors could provide a sustainable alternative. “Biological neurons are up to a million times more energy efficient than artificial ones,” Jordan explained, noting that they can also be cultivated indefinitely in the lab unlike the increasingly scarce AI chips made by companies like Nvidia. For now, however, wetware remains in its infancy far from rivaling the raw computational strength of today’s hardware-driven world, but potentially pointing the way toward the next frontier in computing. And another question lingers: could these tiny brains become conscious? Brain power To make its “bioprocessors,” FinalSpark first purchases stem cells. These cells, which were originally human skin cells from anonymous human donors, can become any cell in the body. FinalSpark’s scientists then turn them into neurons, which are collected into millimetre-wide clumps called brain organoids. They are around the size of the brain of a fruit fly larvae, Jordan said. Electrodes are attached to the organoids in the lab, which allow the scientists to “spy on their internal discussion,” he explained. The scientists can also stimulate the organoids with a small electric current. Whether they respond with a spike in activity or not is roughly the equivalent of the ones or zeroes in traditional computing. Ten universities around the world are conducting experiments using FinalSpark’s organoids — the small company’s website even has a live feed of the neurons at work. Benjamin Ward-Cherrier, a researcher at the University of Bristol, used one of the organoids as the brain of a simple robot that managed to distinguish between different braille letters. There are many challenges, including encoding the data in a way the organoid might understand — then trying to interpret what the brain cells “spit out,” he told AFP. “Working with robots is very easy by comparison,” Ward-Cherrier said with a laugh. “There’s also the fact that they are living cells and that means that they do die,” he added. Indeed, Ward-Cherrier was halfway through an experiment when the organoid died and his team had to start over. FinalSpark says the organoids live for up to six months. At Johns Hopkins University in the United States, researcher Lena Smirnova is using similar organoids to study brain conditions such as autism and Alzheimer’s disease in the hopes of finding new treatments. Biocomputing is currently more “pie in the sky,” unlike the “low-hanging fruit” use of the technology for biomedical research but that could change dramatically over the next 20 years, she told AFP. Do organoids dream of electric sheep? All the scientists AFP spoke to dismissed the idea that these tiny balls of cells in petri dishes were at risk of developing anything resembling consciousness. Jordan acknowledged that “this is at the edge of philosophy,” which is why FinalSpark collaborates with ethicists. He also pointed out that the organoids which lack pain receptors have around 10,000 neurons, compared to a human brain’s 100 billion. However much about our brains, including how they create consciousness, remains a mystery. That is why Ward-Cherrier hopes that beyond computer processing biocomputing will ultimately reveal more about how our brains work. Back in the lab, Jordan opens the door of what looks like a big fridge containing 16 brain organoids in a tangle of tubes. Lines suddenly start spiking on the screen next to the incubator, indicating significant neural activity. The brain cells have no known way of sensing that their door has been opened, and the scientists have spent years trying to figure why this happens. “We still don’t understand how they detect the opening of the door,” Jordan admitted.
Scientists develop computers powered by human mini-brains
