IBMs Electronic Blood Might Solve Computer Scaling Problems

This is a most fascinating idea, electronic blood. The idea is to solve computer scaling problems by combining power transfer and cooling using what IBM calls ‘5D Electronic blood’. The technology is clearly inspired by biological processes.

According to Ars Technica, IBM wants to mimic the human body and use electronic “blood” to deliver power and cooling to the processor at the same time. Liquid cooling, of course, is extremely potent and we’ve covered early efforts to move liquid closer to the CPU components that it is needed to cool. Providing power at the same time, however, is unprecedented. While the capability is still in early days — but the ability to deliver electricity via cooling fluid could be critically important to solving two other problems: Power delivery and die stacking.

This new technology might solve a problem in CPU’s known as hot spots, where parts of the CPU are hotter than others, making cooling them more difficult. Using electronic blood it might be possible to stack CPU cores on top of each other, something that before been impossible due to cooling issues.

Charged-up electrochemical fluid (“5D blood”) goes in the blue pots, and then they flow around the system and into the red pots, providing power and cooling to the chip in the middle. The blood then needs to be ‘recharged’.