Industry news

Vital breakthrough in PC invention reported

Scientists have claimed to have invented a fourth component for an electrical circuit that could enable the development of a PC that will never need rebooting, according to reports.

HP has announced that it has developed a model based on a theory suggested by a scientist in the seventies, according to Reuters.

Leon Chua of the University of California theorised that there should be a fourth fundamental element of a passive circuit, called a memory resistor.

A HP team led by Stanley Williams has proven that 'memristance' exists, producing a mathematical model and physical example of a memristor.

Discussing the invention in the journal Nature, Mr Williams said: "If you turn on your computer it will come up instantly where it was when you turned it off. That is a very interesting potential application and one that is very realistic.

"It turns out that memristance ... gets more important as the device gets smaller. That is another major reason it took so long to find," he concluded.

Mr Williams was recently awarded the 2007 Glenn T Seaborg Medal from the UCLA department of chemistry and biochemistry.