A PARALLEL ASSOCIATIVE COMPUTER FOR HIGH-SPEED EXECUTION OF LOGIC PROGRAMS AND EXPERT SYSTEMS

SYMBOLIC COMPUTATION (ESPECIALLY LOGIC PROGRAMMING) WILL PLAY AN INCREASINGLY IMPORTANT ROLE IN BOTH EXPERIMENTAL ANDTHEORETICAL PHYSICS. LOGIC PROGRAMS ARE ALSO IMPORTANT IN THEIR APPLICATION TO EXPERT SYSTEMS, WHICH ARE IN INCREASINGUSE BY THE UTILITY INDUSTRY. AS THESE EXPERT SYSTEMS BECOME MORE COMPLEX, AND AS THEY ARE USED IN TIME-CRITICAL APPLICATIONS, THEIR COMPUTATIONAL REQUIREMENTS OUTSTRIP THE CAPABILITIES OF TODAY'S COMPUTERS. IT IS BELIEVED THAT VERYHIGH PERFORMANCE CAN BE OBTAINED ON A MACHINE OF MODEST COST, BY USE OF NOVEL VERY LARGE SCALE INTEGRATION (VLSI) ASSOCIATED MEMORY ARCHITECTURES. THIS OPTIMISM IS SUPPORTED BY PRELIMINARY STUDIES AND SIMULATIONS. THIS STUDY DETERMINES THE FEASIBILITY OF A HIGH PERFORMANCE PROLOG ENGINE BASED ON CONTENT ADDRESSABLE MEMORY AND A REDUCED INSTRUCTION SET COMPUTER DESIGNED FOR MULTIPROCESSING (THE TRANSPUTER). THE PROJECT INCLUDES THE RESULTS OF AN INSTRUMENTED SIMULATION AND OF A VLSI DESIGN STUDY. EXPECTED PERFORMANCE IS IN EXCESS OF 1,000,000 LOGICAL INFERENCES PER SECOND.