When Computers Grow Brains: Rethinking AI with Living Cells

What does intelligence look like when biology and technology converge?Dr Hon Weng Chong, founder of Cortical Labs, invited us to explore a radical shift in computing: what happens when intelligence is built not from code alone, but from living brain cells connected to a chip. Hon introduced the field of organic computing to create systems that learn, adapt and operate using a fraction of the energy and data required by traditional AI.

His team has already demonstrated this by growing neurons on computer chips and teaching them to play a game in minutes.At the centre of his work is the human brain, the only known system capable of general intelligence. Rather than continuing to replicate its behaviour through increasingly resource-intensive machines, Hon proposes a different path: building computers from the very cells that make intelligence possible.

This breakthrough opens new possibilities, from personalised medicine tested on a person’s own cells to more efficient, adaptable machines. It also raises urgent ethical questions around ownership, responsibility and consciousness, questions that emerge when technology is no longer separate from life itself.Hon’s talk challenges us to rethink intelligence, computation and what it means to be human, especially as biology and technology continue to converge beyond the horizon.