The world's largest supercomputer which can complete more than 200 million million actions per second has been switched on for the first time.

The $19.5 million computer, which is designed and built to work like a human brain, had its landmark one-millionth processor core fitted last November.

Dubbed the SpiNNaker machine, it can model more neurons in real time than any other machine on the planet.  The supercomputer will help scientists better understand how neurological diseases like Parkinson's impact the brain.

Researchers at the University of Manchester spent more than 10 years constructing SpiNNaker.  Each of the computer's chips has 100 million moving parts, and are designed to mimic the neurons of the human brain.

Project scientist Professor Steve Furber said: 'SpiNNaker completely re-thinks the way conventional computers work.  We've essentially created a machine that works more like a brain than a traditional computer, which is extremely exciting.  The ultimate objective for the project has always been a million cores in a single computer for real time brain modelling applications, and we have now achieved it, which is fantastic.'

Biological neurons are basic brain cells present in the nervous system that communicate primarily by emitting 'spikes' of electrical energy.  Neuromorphic computing uses large scale computer systems containing electronic circuits to mimic these spikes in a machine.

SpiNNaker is unique because, unlike traditional computers, it doesn't communicate by sending large amounts of information from point A to B via a standard network.  Instead it mimics the massively parallel communication architecture of the brain, sending billions of small amounts of information simultaneously to thousands of different destinations.  The computer's creators eventually aim to model up to a billion biological neurons in real time and are now a step closer.  To give an idea of scale, a mouse brain consists of around 100 million neurons and the human brain is 1,000 times bigger than that.  One billion neurons is 1 per cent of the scale of the human brain, which consists of just under 100 billion brain cells, or neurons.

One of the computer's core uses is to help neuroscientists better understand how our own brain works.  It does this by running extremely large scale real-time simulations which aren't possible on other machines.

For example, SpiNNaker has been used to simulate high-level real-time processing in a range of isolated brain networks.  This includes an 80,000 neuron model of a segment of the cortex, the outer layer of the brain that receives and processes information from the senses.  It also has simulated a region of the brain called the Basal Ganglia - an area affected in Parkinson's disease, meaning it has massive potential for neurological breakthroughs in science such as pharmaceutical testing.

Extracted from: www.dailymail.co.uk

Appealing to rich people's desire to control events is a better tactic to get them to donate to charity, rather than their community spirit.  That's the finding of a psychological study building on previous research which found that the wealthy value control more than people on lower incomes.  Donations from high earners were 1.5 times larger when researchers tailored the wording of letters requesting financial support to play on this desire.

Experts from Harvard University wrote to 12,000 alumni of an Ivy League business school - who were earning $100,000 per year or more - asking them to donate to the school.  Two sets of letters were sent out – one saying the ‘community’ needed to take action, while the other called on individual action.

The letters were phrased respectively as 'Sometimes, one person needs to come forward and take individual action' or 'Sometimes, one community needs to come forward and support a common goal.'

Respondents to the second letter gave $432 on average compared to the $270 average from the first group, around $162 or 1.5 times more.

Speaking to New Scientist Ashley Whillans, who led the research, said of the findings: 'We think that giving high-income earners a sense of control makes them want to give more.  Charities often use messages that highlight how positive the action is, like, "it’s so important to help the environment", but they may benefit from tailoring their messages to people’s self-interested motivations instead.'

A recent Harvard study found that no matter how much money you have you are never happy with the amount.

Researchers at Harvard Business School quizzed 2,000 millionaires for the paper, which is considered to be the first of its kind to focus solely on this level of wealth.

One quarter of millionaires worth $1.5 million said they'd need eleven times more money to be perfectly happy, while one quarter said they would need six times as much.

Another quarter said they would need twice as much money to finally be happy.

Interestingly, this 'did not differ by wealth' and the perceived need that more money equates to more happiness was expressed even by those with a net worth of more than $7.6 million.

The full findings of the latest study were published in the journal PLoS One.

Extracted from: www.dailymail.co.uk