How fast and powerful can computers become? Will it be possible someday to create artificial brains that have intellectual capabilities comparable to those of human beings? The answers to these questions depend to a very great extent on a single factor: how small and dense we can make computer circuits. Very recently, scientists have achieved revolutionary advances that may very well radically change the future of computing.

There are significant advantages to using biological molecules in a new computational paradigm, since nature has solved similar problems to those encountered in harnessing organic molecules to perform data manipulation. Biomolecules could be used as photonic devices in holography, as spatial light modulators, in neural network optical computing, as nonlinear optical devices, and as optical memories. Such computers may use a billion times less energy than electronic computers, while storing data in a trillionth of the space, while also being highly parallel. Research projects implemented by national and international groups have produced a large amount of data from multidisciplinary work, ranging from physics and engineering to chemistry and biology.

Inhalt
Quantum Mechanical Design of Light Driven Molecular Logical Machines and Elements of Molecular Quantum Computers.- Extreme Miniaturization: Molecular-Level Devices and Machines.- Tetrathiafulvalene and its Derivatives as ?-Electron Donating Units in Pseudorotaxanes, Rotaxanes, and Catenaries.- Hybrid Ferroxide - Organic Layers.- Molecular Electronic Devices.- The Lipid Bilayer Principle and Molecular Electronics.- Molecular Control of Electron Transfer Events Within and Between Biomolecules.- Peptide Foldamers as Building Blocks for Ordered Nanomolecular Architectures: A Structural Investigation.- Influence of Substance Structure on Change of Electrochemical Properties of Bilayer Lipid Membranes.- Biomolecular Electronic Device Applications of Bacteriorhodopsin: Three-Dimensional Optical & Holographic Associative Memories, Integrated Biosensors.- Photoinduced Anisotropy and Dynamic Polarization Holography on Bacteriorhodopsin Films for Optical Information Processing.- Bioelectronics: Development of Biosensors, Biofuel-Cells and Circuitry.- Optical Waveguide Lightmode Spectroscopy and Biocomputing.- Biosensors In Flow Conditions For Biological Analytes.- Optical and Electrochemical Biosensors for Express Environmental Monitoring.- An Algorithm Generating Long Sequences of Stimuli in Behavioral Science: a Suitable Test for Biosensors.- Physiological and Artificial Biosensor for Odour Recognition Systems.- Euglena Gracilis Case: a Real Biosensor.- The Future of the Electronics Industry and the Potential of Molecular Electronics.- Development of Future Sensor Generations: Commercial Vs. Technological Aspects.- Molecular Recognition: Synthetic Receptors by Rational Design and Targeted Synthesis.- The Enigma of Creative Problem Solving: A Biocomputing Perspective.