Transcription
We realized that the best way [music] to
do a better AI was to use living
neurons. Biological processor are made
of living cells. This has never been
done in in history. This is basically
what is running CHP [music] for
instance. It was taking several kilowatt
of power. Your brain is 20 W for 100
billion of neurons. We used more
sophisticated [music] versions of these
artificial neurons. What's about the
ethical issue?
The picturesque town of Ve, Switzerland,
blends natural landscapes with
>> [music]
>> urban fabric. It's home to the
headquarters of one of the most
visionary biotech companies [music]
working to create a so-called living
computer. Is it possible to combine the
computational power of computers [music]
with the efficiency of the human brain?
Final Spark is a Swiss bio computing
startup that is the first in the world
to build a living processor, creating a
bioprocessor capable of [music] learning
while consuming over a million times
less energy than conventional silicon
systems.
>> What is it human brain organo?
It's basically a small part of nervous
tissue made of neuron coming from
human beings. [music] What is it your
human brain project?
So [music]
first when you talk about human brain
project this is first a uran project.
[music] Okay. Um and uh that somehow
inspired [music] us. Okay. But it's not
really a project related to human brain
actually. Um there are many people uh
doing human brain organoids in the world
and in Europe also. Uh [music] this is
not as such this is not something um
even I would say very advanced. Okay. uh
what is a bit special in our company
[music] is that what we are trained to
do with this brain organoids is to use
them for computation.
So it's the goal that we have and the
work that we do which is original. You
see what is behind the corner.
Well, I don't know if I see what's
behind the corner, but that's right.
That's a it's a very original thinking
[music] uh to think that human neurons
can be used for computation. [music]
How do you collect human cells?
Okay. uh we buy human cells from
companies that are specialized to
produce them and they [music] are pur
potent stem cells. So they usually they
come from fiberblast so skin cells that
are reprogram it to [music] become purip
potent. So this means that they can
become whatever type of cells. [music]
How is it possible to create the neuron
cells from using you know skin cells?
>> Yeah, exactly. Is because we
there are methodologies that we can use
to uh the differentiate the skin cells.
[music] So bring them back to the pur
potent state and then from this point we
can differentiate them in neurons. to
give them um specific molecules in the
culture medium
from uh puripotent [music] stem cells
and then we
make sure that they are pur potent. So
we check some markers to make sure that
they will be able to differentiate in
neurons and astroite and other type of
cells in the brain. And then we yeah we
culture them with special uh molecules
that will induce the [music] cells will
tell the cells to become a neuron. So we
are in the cell culture room and is the
place where we grow the brain organoids
and they are in the incubator where we
found like um
precise temperature [music] and CO2
concentration. Inside of these plates we
have different type of organoids that we
are growing. First of all, actually we
um grow them in a special plate that
[music] allow them to create a 3D
structure and then uh step by step we
give different type of uh reagents or
molecules as we we can say that will
tell them to [music] to become
specific type of cells and also they
will reorganize in structures [music]
that are similar to part of the brains.
The function will be similar to um fatal
[music] brain.
Some are in the orbital shaker because
the shaking uh helps the nutrients and
the oxygens to enter inside the
organoid.
>> How do you keep your neurons [music]
cells alive?
>> So, we give them a special um solution.
So [music] it's a it's called cell
culture medium that contains nutrients
and uh that help [music] them to to
live.
[music]
>> How do you keep this on organoid alive
in that system? I know as you can see
there is uh maybe not in really in the
picture but uh we have a fluidic system
below. So uh so we have pipes and bring
the the medium actually. So we have pump
[music] and um so the medium is really
flowing below the the organoid. So
[snorts] the organ exactly will be on
this on on the top of uh
>> so all the time they are feding.
>> Yeah. All the time. Yes. So with this
system we can keep them alive usually
one two three it can be months sometimes
it's but mostly it's like two weeks you
can see the the pump the pump speed
actually of all the MA so for example
you can see that we are running at
around I don't know 30 or 50 microL per
minute [music]
>> how long time you can keep these cells
alive 1 year 2 years 3 years
>> we managed to keep them al almost 3
years alive.
>> How we can connect that organoid with
your neuron platform?
>> We [music] put the organoid on top of
the electrons and we record their
activities [music]
what we can see. So this actually
through you when you go to the website
you can see the live actually so these
pictures. So we have four different MEA.
So actually it's a closeup on this part.
>> Okay. MEA is
>> multi-elerode array.
>> So because there is a lot of different
electrode that you can see maybe better
on this picture you see this littleer.
[music]
>> What you can see it's uh we have five
MEA. [music] So the black one is a new
one that you are trying now. [music] But
what you can see on the website is the
that one the clear one. You see this one
on the bottom the two on the bottom. So
difference. So that one it mean you put
one or two organoid here. So you can
record from eight electro they will be
independent. We call this it's a
membrane actually with with a hole in
the middle. Uh we call it confetti. Uh
but um why it's just a membrane actually
it helps to to for [music] me to put in
the middle the um the organoid and also
it helps to uh to reduce the noise.
>> Why [music] did you start this project?
Why biomputing? Why so futuristic vision
of the reality?
[music]
The first thing you know I'm an engineer
so I always try to solve problems. Okay.
and take the best solution for a given
problem. Okay. And initially when we
started to work on this, you know, I
have a PhD in signal processing,
basically mathematics, nothing to do
with neurobiology. Okay. So I can't tell
you if I could have avoided [music]
to learn an entire new field, I would
have preferred. But when we started the
company, we worked a lot with artificial
neural networks.
Artificial neural networks are
simulations of neurons. This is
basically what is running CHP for
instance, okay, an old generative AI.
[music]
And we used more sophisticated versions
of these artificial neurons. And they
were consuming so much energy that we
realized it [music] would be impossible
to scale this
like like with 100 simulated [music]
neurons, it would take it was taking
several kilowatts of power. Imagine
[music] your brain is 20 watts for 100
billion of neurons.
86 billion neurons we have in a human
brain. Yeah. Uh you think 20 [music]
watts for calculation. That's the reason
that you uh decided to open that
company.
No, the main reason of opening this
company was first to do fundamental
research in AI and in the course of this
fundamental research, [music] we
realized that the best way to do a
better AI was to use [music] living
neurons.
>> What's the difference between biological
and classical processor? between
bological and classical processor.
Well, biological processor are made of
living cells which is totally
disruptive. Indeed, [music] this has
never been done in the history.
[music]
I know that I I saw your butterfly
experiment. What is it?
>> Yeah, the butterfly experiment. um is a
way
to show in the browser internet browser
of a user uh how he can interact
directly from his internet browser in 3D
with [music] a brain of sitting in
Switzerland in our lab. This is a visual
illustration of this [music] and you see
this butterfly
flying in three dimension and you can
actually control its [music] direction.
The idea is when the
the butterfly see the light. So the
these [music] blue these big blue dots
you send stimulation and if the
butterfly reply to the stimulation you
go straight. So it mean you go to the
light and if not so you are randomly
going everywhere and when he he reply so
[music] you can see actually here that
after each stimulation this big line you
can see that there is some reply
probably a lot of neuron are discussing
u when you saw this big wave actually we
call burst because there are probably
more than one neuron that are sending
information so it's essentially here we
see a lot of communication
>> you have a communication with organoids,
right?
>> Yeah. Yes, exactly. We have but not
between each of them. So like for
example here you see again a burst of a
lot of neurons [music]
>> they are processing the information. So
so how do you enforce such neurons to
process such information?
>> Yeah, dopamine.
>> So in the [music] way you the words that
you use here makes a lot of sense to me.
Okay. Uh if you talk about processing
information and enforcing a behavior
okay uh one so this is called learning
okay enforcing a behavior okay and this
is the main challenge that everybody
every research in the researcher in the
world of bio computing has to challenge
[music] today okay um so your question
one way that we are indeed pursuing here
is to use for [music] instance dopamine
to reward the brain if it does what we
expect
but there are other strategies which are
used by [music] the by others. Do you
have any progress?
>> Very slow progress. Okay. Because we
need to confirm experiment. [music] Even
if something works once, it does not
mean it works at all. Okay? We are
engineers more [music] than scientists
in the sense that we want something that
works.
What's about the ethical issue?
>> So,
you know, first we are scientist. Okay.
Uh any questions about science? Uh I may
be able to answer
probably
actually not most of the important
questions in science we are not able to
answer but some of the technical
question I may be answer. [music] Uh now
if you think about ethical questions
this is really out of the field of
expertise of final spark. Um and for
this uh we recognized this is a concern
and what we did is that we made a number
of contact with universities and eition
because they are experts in this field
of ethics people [music] there this is
their job actually to study and what we
do is that we went also to conference in
November last year for instance [music]
to present in an ethic conference to
additions what we were doing so So that
those people who are experts in this
[music] can start to think what would be
the implication of using living neurons
for computation. Why human cells?
[music] Yeah, that's a very good
question actually. If you think about
computation probably rat cells could
could also work very well. Okay. The
thing is when you create a startup you
never know what are going to be um the
outcome. Sometimes you may discover
something along the way that is very
useful
and one of the things that we could
discover along the way could have
therapeutic applications
and I'd better have therapeutic
applications [music] for human beings
than for rats.
moment that shocked you that you uh that
surprised you positively [music]
here in this frame of sport?
>> Well, when we were able to record some
activity from neurons, it was already a
fantastic uh thing. When we were able to
to cells, you know, from liquid nitrogen
and multiply them ourselves, we were
able to see some reaction
>> of the nervous tissue to the pamine and
the waves.
>> Yeah. Yeah. We see we saw some activity
which is typical induced by the release
of the pine. This was [music]
one
one I would say major achievement for
us. Okay. But just always put in
perspective that we were starting from
ground zero.
>> Do you really believe that biomputing is
the future of data processing is a
future of computing?
>> Yes absolutely [music]
specifically for one type of computing.
Okay, computing of AI. Okay, like
quantum computing may be restricted some
some types of computing, bio computing
will be restricted also to some task of
computing. But AI is absolutely perfect
for an obvious reason. AI is based on
simulations of neurons.
[music]
>> [music]