Estimating the energy requirements for long term memory formation
Neurons and Cognition
2023-02-09 v2 Machine Learning
Neural and Evolutionary Computing
Abstract
Brains consume metabolic energy to process information, but also to store memories. The energy required for memory formation can be substantial, for instance in fruit flies memory formation leads to a shorter lifespan upon subsequent starvation (Mery and Kawecki, 2005). Here we estimate that the energy required corresponds to about 10mJ/bit and compare this to biophysical estimates as well as energy requirements in computer hardware. We conclude that biological memory storage is expensive, but the reason behind it is not known.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2301.09565,
title = {Estimating the energy requirements for long term memory formation},
author = {Maxime Girard and Jiamu Jiang and Mark CW van Rossum},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2301.09565},
year = {2023}
}
Comments
7 pages, 1 figure