Ohio State University scientists exploring bioinspired alternatives to current computers have created a ‘brain-inspired’ processor that works with fungus-based materials collected from common mushrooms such as shitakes.
Designed to mimic the activity of neurons on the brain, the bioinspired computer is highly energy efficient compared to traditional designs. The research team behind the discovery said this increased efficiency of its neural activity-based application could offer a significant advantage in energy consumption, which is increasingly in demand as the Internet of Things (IoT) continues to grow.
“Being able to develop microchips that mimic actual neural activity means you don’t need a lot of power for standby or when the machine isn’t being used,” said John LaRocco, lead author of the study and a research scientist in psychiatry at Ohio State’s College of Medicine. “That’s something that can be a huge potential computational and economic advantage.”
In a press release announcing the study, LaRocco and OSU co-authors Ruben Petreaca, John Simonis, and Justin Hill note that fungus-based electronics are not new. However, La Rocco said they have become “ideal candidates” for sustainable computing systems due to their material versatility.
For example, fungus-based designs dramatically reduce electronic waste, a growing international problem. These computers are also biodegradable. They are also cheaper to fabricate than current designs, since they don’t require any rare earth metals. That’s because these bioinspired systems can be made from common mushrooms like shiitakes, which can be grown in a wide range of climates.
The key component used in previous mushroom-based computer designs is called Mycelium. The processor types created using mushrooms are not called processors. Instead, they are a type of computer based on the human brain’s neural activity called a memristor, which can remember past electrical states. The team said they hoped to improve on previous Mycelium-based memristor designs to determine the technology’s limits.
“Mycelium as a computing substrate has been explored before in less intuitive setups,” LaRocco said, “but our work tries to push one of these memristive systems to its limits.
First, the team selected samples of shitake and button mushrooms as the material basis for their bioinspired fungus computer. This process involved growing, harvesting, and then drying the mushrooms to preserve overall integrity and “ensure long-term viability.”
Next, the dried mushrooms were connected to electronic circuits and “electrocuted” at varying voltages and frequencies. LaRocco said the team would connect the electrical wires to the mushrooms at differing points since the different parts of the mushroom’s structure possess “different electrical properties.”
“Depending on the voltage and connectivity, we were seeing different performances,” the researcher explained.
After two months of experiments, the team compared their mushroom-based memristor to traditional RAM used for data storage. According to their published study, the team’s bioinspired memristor successfully switched between electrical states at “up to 5,850 signals per second.” The fungus-based system also achieved 90% accuracy.
“These shiitake-based devices not only demonstrated similar reproducible memory effects to semiconductor-based chips but could also be used to create other types of low-cost, environmentally friendly, brain-inspired computing components,” they explained.
The team noted that their system’s performance did show a discernible drop as the electrical frequency increased. However, they suggest that their neural activity-based design would most likely respond like a normal brain and correct its performance by simply connecting more mushrooms to the circuit.
Although the technology is still in its early stages of development, the team suggested several potential methods to improve the design and performance of fungus-based memristors, including optimizing mushroom cultivation techniques. The team also noted that the designs would need to be miniaturized, as those used in the experiments were impractical.
Qudsia Tahmina, co-author of the study and an associate professor in electrical and computer engineering at Ohio State, said the mushroom-based computer design could be scaled for applications in edge computing, aerospace exploration, autonomous systems, and wearable devices. The researcher also noted how surprisingly easy it was to program mushrooms to behave in unexpected and useful ways, and how the technologies can advance when they rely on the natural world.
“Society has become increasingly aware of the need to protect our environment and ensure that we preserve it for future generations,” said Tahmina. “So that could be one of the driving factors behind new bio-friendly ideas like these.”
When discussing the versatility of their design, LaRocco said everything needed to start “exploring fungi and computing” is available, from something as small as a compost heap and a few homemade electronics to “as big as a culturing factory with pre-made templates.”
“All of them are viable with the resources we have in front of us now,” the researcher added.
The study “Sustainable memristors from shiitake mycelium for high-frequency bioelectronics” was published in PLOS One.
Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.