Departmental Colloquium
- Title
- The stochastic thermodynamics of computation
- Guest Speaker
- David Wolpert
- Guest Affiliation
- Santa Fe Institute Resident Professor Complexity Science Hub Vienna External Professor, Arizona State University Adjunct professor
- When
- Thursday, October 27, 2022 3:55 pm - 4:55 pm
- Location
- Physics Auditorium (202)
- Details
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One of the major resource requirements of computers — ranging from biological cells to human brains to digital computers — are the free energy costs in running them. These thermodynamic properties of computers have been a long-standing focus of research in statistical physics, going back (at least) to the early semi-formal work of Maxwell and of Szilard.
Recent revolutionary breakthroughs in stochastic thermodynamics are allowing us for the first time to analyze the thermodynamics of computers in a fully rigorous manner. Here I illustrate some of these recent results, including the thermodynamic costs of (loop-free) digital circuits, of Turing machines, and of asynchronous distributed computers like the interacting organelles in a cell.