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Water Computing
Andrew_Cronin writes "This is a nice project that some one did at MIT on building some logic computation systems without using electrons.. So why not use water..."
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Doesn't anyone know? Water and computers dont mix. Make up yuour mind. You can either make fun of water-cooling OR make computers out of water.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
.. how long until we see a computer constructed using bong water?
Brings new meaning to the term "Bit bucket"
Three dits, four dits, two dits, dah!
Radio, radio, rah rah rah!
If you overclock it, can it cool itself?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Will we use electricity to cool it? Well water is a very effective cooler on electronics, so why not do it the reverse when your water is your 'electronics'?
p pp pppppppppp
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPpp
YOUCH!!!!!
DAMN ME!!!!! THAT !*!@# HURTS.
Scratch that idea.
What we see depends on mainly what we look for. -- John Lubbock Now search for that bug slave!
He says without electronics, not without electrons... Last time I checked a molecule of water had, oh say about 10 electrons in it...
Scientific American had an article about water-based logic gates and circuits some decades ago. IIRC, they even created circuits that had no electronic analogy. I can find no reference to this on the web - perhaps some other science geek with access to a complete collection could find it. I believe it was in the Amateur Scientist, but it's been about fifteen years since I read through the stacks of magazines in the cabinets of my chemistry classroom, so I could be mistaken.
For a similar concept (ie, non-silicon machine logic) that I first read about in the pages of Scientific American, check out the Apraphulians here . For more info on this ancient race, Google is your friend.
I've considered water-based computation long ago, but hats off to this student for logic design and implementation. My idea was to have water push open another wate gate, much like a flow-controlled valve, allowing for a water-based transistor. Combine this with other transistors, and you can build virtually any gate--I take that back, any gate you want. XOR and AND are good choices, as with a XOR a you can get NOT, to make a NAND, and as we all know NAND is the Univesal Binary Gate.
"The lesson to be learned is not to take the comments on slashdot too literally." --Vinnie Falco, BearShare
I really remember seeing a documentary on how the russians tried using water logic for computations and got pretty good with it back in the 40's. Then again they did alot of cool stuff over in that part of the world. They actually managed to stick with 50's technology for 40 years. yay communism! I knew someone who had no more after the berlin wall came down just because his job was dependent upon the crappy stuff they made breaking down. Reliable products from the west caused alot of people to loose their jobs.
I know it's an off topic rant, wanna give me some points for being interesting anyway?
Looks like we "flooded" the server...
Hell, take that thing on a pub crawl and have your beer do it's own calculations of how much tip you should leave as it's on it's way down to your stomach!
Liberty.
Simple. The author gives XOR and AND gates, formed from joining two streams together, without and without a control. (See the article for details, I haven't taken the time to look into it very deeply).
Anyways, XOR's function number is 0110. Split it in two, and you get "A(01) when B=0, NOT A(10) when B=1"--two unary gates formed a binary gate. Split AND's function, 0001, and you get "0 when B=0, A when B=1". Trust me, this is easier than it seems. The unary gates are: 00=0, 01=B, 10=NOT B, and 11=1. Now that we got that out of the way:
None of those are useful except 1^A=!A. We need NOT to complete our library of functions too. Now we can combine it with other gates like so using Boolean Algebra:
NOT(A XOR B) = A XNOR B
NOT(A AND B) = NOT(A) OR NOT(B)DeMorgan's Law
NOT(A AND NOT(B)) = NOT(A) OR NOT(NOT(B)) = NOT(A) OR B
And now, ladies and gentlement, I present to you, The OR Gate:
not(not(a) and not(b)) = not(not(a)) or not(not(b)) = a or b
This is constructed from: 1 xor ((1 xor a) and (1 xor b)), and of course the 1 is simply a constant flowing stream of high-power water. And obviously, since NAND is a universal gate, this can be done like so:
1 xor (a and b) = a nand b
NAND can make any gate, including NOT, which is then combined as we saw above to form OR, NOR, XOR, XNOR, and even inhibitation and implication if you please.
Did that answer your question?
-jc
How can people argue about this for so long!?!? If you really know nothing about chemistry, don't post about it.
Oxygen is element 8. It has 8 electrons. 6 of them are valence elecrons (in the 2s and 2p orbitals) and 2 of them are "core" electrons in the 1s orbital. Only the valence electrons get drawn in those dot diagrams, that's why you can only see six on some sites.
Hydrogen is element 1. It has 1 electron. This electron is in the 1s orbital.
Water is H2O, where the 2 is subscript. It has 2 hydrogens and one oxygen, with polar-covalent bonds between them, so there are 2*1+1*8=10 electrons. Two of them are in oxygen's 1s orbital, four of them are in two of oxygen's four sp3 hybrid orbitals, and four of them are shared between hydrogen's 1s orbital and the other two of oxygen's sp3 hybrids (one orbital and two electrons for each hydrogen).
Don't even get me started on sp3* anti-bonding pairs.
Sorry for being inconsistent as to whether numbers should be spelled out.
I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
Inductance is the same as momentum. You could build a gadget that has a turbine in the water flow with a fly wheel attached. The gadget would resist water flow starting up, and would resist the water flow slowing down once it's moving. (same as an inductor fighting a change in current)
Capacitance is the same as a flexible membrane across the pipe, which will transmit AC changes in pressure, but not DC.
You could build a capacitor/inductor tuned circuit that either filters or passes certain frequency water waves
Also, water transistors should be fun. A small flow or pressure of water controls a larger flow or pressure (in either an analog or digital fashion)
It would be a way fun tool for teaching electronics.
Ben in DC
"It's the mark of an educated mind to be moved by statistics" Oscar Wilde
Every time I try to overclock it, all the circuits freeze up.
We're thinking of giving up on liquid nitrogen and trying liquid helium.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Actually, it might not be that bad. Just drain it and put it in a box. Looks like most of the components are plastic, so it'll be pretty light. When you get to where you're going, just fill it from the tap.
Instant computer... just add water!
End of lesson. You may press the button.
a friend of mine in college (Aron) made a water adder capable of adding two 8-bit values -- all with water streams.
LINK
... water analog computers have been used since 1949... till mid 80-x for modelling differential equations.
They were used for large-scale projects, such as modelling of water dams.
Didn't we just have a different "font" article?
I/O Error G-17: Aborting Installation
... but I bet that in a few months, it'll all just turn out to be vaporware.
The MIT students didn't quite get it right. Their gadget doesn't seem to have gain. The key insight needed for fluidics is that a jet of fluid can be diverted with a smaller jet coming in from the side. This allows building a fluidic amplifier.
Once you have an amplifier, you can do switches, gates, flip-flops, and other logic elements. Analog control systems, with fluidic sensors and amplifiers driving pneumatic or hydraulic cylinders, are also possible. When the inputs and outputs are pneumatic or hydraulic, it's often convenient if the control system is, too. Fluidic elements are very reliable, too - there are no moving parts except the working fluid.
One wierd fluidic application is this kosher public address system.