GE Brain connects us to our machines
‘Neo: Is that…
Cypher: The Matrix? Yeah.
Neo: Do you always look at it encoded?
Cypher: Well you have to. The image translators work for the construct program. But there’s way too much information to decode the Matrix. You get used to it. I…I don’t even see the code. All I see is blonde, brunette, red-head. Hey, you a… want a drink?’ — The Matrix
There are 6 billion people in the world. Every one of us is generating and consuming information at ever increasing rates. In contrast there are trillions of objects, both real and virtual, creating and consuming orders of magnitudes more information; sensors, automobiles, factories, websites, search engines, grocery stores, the list is nearly endless. To survive, we must connect to the cyber world in a way that humans can deal with. We must teach our machines to serve us.
Over the past decade the world has labeled, identified (RFID, UID), and integrated (Internet, SAT communication, GPRS, WiFi/WiMAX, Bluetooth, Zigbee) billions of physical objects into complex and dynamic systems. As ubiquitous sensors and microprocessors proliferate, the torrent of data has begun to overwhelm traditional IT structures. In 2007, the size of the digital universe (the amount of information created, captured, and replicated) surpassed the amount of physical storage available on the planet. Information is a commodity that we pay money to get, pay money to maintain, and pay money to get rid of. Many of us paid to buy our local newspaper yesterday, only to have to pay someone to remove it today. This enormous amount of available information, specifically because of its distributed and time sensitive nature, poses large problems but even larger opportunities.
One system designed to leverage the pervasive availability of information is the GE Brain. The GE Brain is a mobile, low cost sensing, processing, and communication hub that will serve as a platform for an artificially conscious distributed decisioning network. It has enormous processing and network capability for its small form factor and is a hardware and software interface between the cyber and physical worlds. Its wired interface is dynamically and plastically configurable to enable it to operate in a large number of environments connected to a variety of sensors and intelligent devices. The communications modules allow it to participate in many wireless networks simultaneously and seamlessly while the application processor and digital signal processors enable collection and distribution of knowledge. These attributes give the GE Brain a situational and contextual self-awareness that enables real time decisioning without constant direct oversight and it does this at the edge of the network eliminating the need for central control.
This intense link between the computational and physical worlds will differentiate this type of Cyber Physical System from traditional embedded systems and drive the development of intelligent, distributed, decisioning systems into the objects of everyday life. Everything from children’s toys, to automobiles, to wind turbines will have elements of pervasive decisioning systems embedded within them and these systems will engage the human race, and our creations, in new and extraordinary ways.
OK, I cannot resist putting together the above quote from The Matrix with the GE Brain hub picture…
Just kidding!
SAN is the blonde, LAN is the redhead and GAN is kind of the brunette
GE Brain is a very interesting project.
Eager to see some cool applications of it.