Chinese researchers have unveiled a new generation of super large-scale brain-like computer, Darwin Monkey, also known as Wukong. Developed by the State Key Laboratory of Brain-Machine Intelligence at Zhejiang University, this computer is based on dedicated neuromorphic chips with over 2 billion neurons and can mimic the workings of a macaque monkey’s brain. The system supports over 100 billion synapses and consumes approximately 2,000 watts of power under typical operating conditions.
The human brain is like an efficient “computer,” and brain-inspired computing aims to build systems that replicate its principles. With low power consumption, high parallelism, and intelligence, brain-inspired computers can excel in various tasks. Darwin Monkey, the world’s first neuromorphic brain-like computer based on dedicated neuromorphic chips, boasts a neuron count approaching that of a macaque brain.
The system is equipped with 960 Darwin 3 neuromorphic computing chips and consists of 15 blade-style neuromorphic brain-like servers. Each chip supports over 2.35 million spiking neurons and hundreds of millions of synapses. The computer can run intelligent applications, including the DeepSeek brain-like large model, which performs tasks like logical reasoning, content generation, and mathematical problem-solving.
Darwin Monkey offers a new computational paradigm for existing computing scenarios, providing a foundation for artificial intelligence (AI) development, brain simulation tools for neuroscientists, and new experimental methods to explore brain mechanisms. The system’s powerful neuronal and synaptic resources allow it to simulate animal brains of varying neuron sizes, including those of macaques.
Source: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202508/1339961.shtml