Cytomorphic electronics is a novel field of designing noise-tolerant ultra-low power cell-inspired circuits. The main goals of this field are to emulate cells, organs, and tissues while considering the stochastic behavior of a single cell and cell-to-cell variation, distortion, and crosstalk using mixed-signal integrated electronics. Simulations of such processes are computationally intensive and can take weeks using modern digital hardware. Cytomorphic electronics are used to design novel large-scale synthetic biological systems by providing a fast and simple emulative framework. Furthermore, the field has aided in designing electronic circuits and networks inspired by molecular biology, with uniquely emergent characteristics and concepts to be adopted for energy-efficient hardware realization.
Joint research with prof. Ramez Daniel from Biomedical Engineering Faculty at the Technion is initiated to design, model, and fabricate cytomorphic integrated circuits by emerging memory technologies and their biological counterparts [1].
[1] H. Abo Hanna, L. Danial, S. Kvatinsky, and R. Daniel, “Cytomorphic Electronics with Memristors for Modeling Fundamental Genetic Circuits”, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Circuits and Systems, Vol. 14, pp. 386-401, June 2020
The NEU-CHiP project is an international collaboration of leaders across a wide range of disciplines, with a shared focus to engineer and apply human neural cell circuits as biological computers. This research draws together a network of researchers working at the cutting edge of scientific discovery to demonstrate how human brain stem cells can be engineered into specifically designed complex circuits enabling them to function as an artificial biological computer. The brain-on-a-chip device will be stimulated and interrogated, being taught to solve problems from data, laying the foundations for a “paradigm shift” in machine learning technology.
As part of the Technion Human Health Initiative (THHI), we are working on a project to create bacterial (E. coli) cells that identify biomarkers in the digestive tract, process this information, and program nano-electronics devices called memristors using biochemical reactions. The required calculations will be performed in the bacterial cells using DNA, proteins, and enzymes that are characterized by at least 1,000 times less energy consumption than any electronics device (e.g., transistor) – the minimal energy required for their activity. The memristors’ activity will be programmed directly by the bacteria from the nutrients that are abundant in the digestive system. Therefore no external energy source will be required for this system.
This project is in collaboration with Prof. Ramez Daniel, Prof. Naama Geva-Zatorsky, Prof. Hossam Haick, and Prof. Eilam Yalon.