Irreversibility and Heat Generation in the Computing Process
From Thermodynamics of Computation
- reference groups
- Computer Science Engineering to Address Energy Costs
- General Non-equilibrium Statistical Physics
- Logically Reversible Computing
- Naturally Occurring Biological Computation
- Thermodynamics of Single Cells
- author-supplied keywords
- keywords
- authors
- Rolf Landauer
- title
- Irreversibility and Heat Generation in the Computing Process
- year
- 1961
- pages
- 183-191
- volume
- 5
- issue
- 3
- publisher
- IBM Corp
- abstract
- It is argued that computing machines inevitably involve devices which perform logical functions that do not have a single-valued inverse. This logical irreversibility is associated with physical irreversibility and requires a minimal heat generation, per machine cycle, typically of the order of kT for each irreversible function. This dissipation serves the purpose of standardizing signals and making them independent of their exact logical history. Two simple, but representative, models of bistable devices are subjected to a more detailed analysis of switching kinetics to yield the relationship between speed and energy dissipation, and to estimate the effects of errors induced by thermal fluctuations.
Counts
- Citation count
- 4256
- Page views
- 59
Identifiers
- doi: https://doi.org/10.1147/rd.53.0183 (Google search)
- issn: 0018-8646