World’s Largest Supercomputer Designed And Built To Work Like A Human Brain Is Switched On For The First Time

The world’s largest supercomputer which can complete more than 200 million million actions per second has been switched on for the first time.

The £15 million ($19.5 million) computer, which is designed and built to work like a human brain, had its landmark one-millionth processor core fitted this week.

Dubbed the SpiNNaker machine, it can model more neurons in real time than any other machine on the planet.

The supercomputer will help scientists better understand how neurological diseases like Parkinson’s impact the brain.

Researchers at the University of Manchester spent more than 10 years constructing SpiNNaker.

Each of the computer’s chips has 100 million moving parts, and are designed to mimic the neurons of the human brain.

Project scientist Professor Steve Furber said: ‘SpiNNaker completely re-thinks the way conventional computers work.

‘We’ve essentially created a machine that works more like a brain than a traditional computer, which is extremely exciting.

‘The ultimate objective for the project has always been a million cores in a single computer for real time brain modelling applications, and we have now achieved it, which is fantastic.’