Research

There are two major research programs at ATG. The Orange Program, which is devoted to carry some basic research projects and make some substantial improvements in all the field. The other program is Appetizer Program, which is devoted to carry some applied research projects and make some substantial improvements in the current trends of computer industry. Here is a list of research projects at Orange and Appetizer programs. This is not an exhaustive list, but it covers our major research projects.



Orange Program


Passive Computation

Description:
The basic factor for evaluating every computational model is the resources that the model needs for computation. The main independent resources in conventional approaches include time and space. Other resources such as energy... depend on time-space and are proportional to them. In the case of computationally hard problems, i.e. NP problems, the required resources (or at least one of them) grow exponentially while the scale of problem grows linearly.
In a recent approach, i.e. quantum computing, it seems that the required resources do not grow exponentially because of the hybrid nature of the qubit, which is referred to as superposition. But it is still unclear that how much energy is needed for isolating the required number of qubits from environment in order to prevent the problem of decoherency. If the amount of this energy would not be a polynomial function of total qubits, then there is no advantage in this approach.
In 1997, an optical computation model for an NP-C problem, the TSP, was presented in which the required time and space grow linearly with the size of the problem while the required energy grows exponentially. In the conventional computation model (Turing machine), it is not possible that a machine needs an exponential amount of energy while it uses a polynomial amount of time and space. We call our proposed computational model passive machine because of using optical passive elements in its structure.
In this project, we classify the existing computational models in terms of the independent resources they need for computation. This classification is as follows:

1. Turing (super-Turing) machine: independent time and space, energy is proportional to time and space.
2. Quantum computer: independent time and space, the relation between energy and time-space is still unclear (because of the problem of decoherency).
3. Passive machine: independent time and space and energy.

Remarks: in May 2002, a similar method to the ATG optical computing model has been proposed for solving the shortest path problem (not the TSP). Although it is not currently effective for the TSP, but it is perfect for the shortest path problem, and more important, it is the second ever built passive machine (after ATG optical machine in 1997), which have been announced yet.
It is our pleasure to see that the domain of research on passive machine has been expanded out of ATG to some other well-known academic institutions like Imperial College London and Harvard University. We hope to see some serious works on passive machine in industrial section, too.

Theory of Need

Description:
The question of what is a living thing is one of the oldest and most interested topics in both of philosophy and science. Many philosophers and scientists have addressed this question, but the one that is a dominating paradigm in computer science was originated in the Von Neumann's works. His approach was a bottom-up view to the problem which distinguishes the basic characteristics of a living thing such as reproduction and metabolism as its distinction factors from non-living things.
Now the question is if it is possible to find a top-down approach to the problem? We think it is possible and if we want to define a living thing in this way, we reach a definition like this: a living thing is an entity which needs other entities to be existed. We refer to this simple definition as the theory of need. Our primary research works show this approach is a very promising one with a range of applications from cognition science and artificial intelligence to synergy and social science. We expect our works toward this approach would result some notable improvements in a few scientific areas in addition to computer science.

Appetizer Program


Appetizer Program is the base of our applied research activities. We follow a wide range of applied research projects in this program. The research results of the program is supposed to be used by the R&D department of the industrial firms around the world. For an exhaustive list of the past and future research projects in this program, please visit the official page of the program.

Before launching the Research Kit Program, we had launched two non-profit research projects as the offspring of our Appetizer Program. These projects had been entitled Persian Gulf and Caspian Horse, which then merged into the Research Kit Program.