a computer having components and circuits formed from or modelled on biological molecules or structures
In later use, as an actual scientific term: a computing device which uses the chemical properties of biological molecules (esp. DNA) to store and process information.
He crushed them, or harnessed them to his plow, or borrowed their neural circuits for his bio-computers.
There will come the future amazing day…when Amazing Stories will be composed, or perhaps outlined in detail, not by human authors, but by an electronic biocomputer-menograph (menos-mind).
‘Caprice is my first experience with a biocomputer. Hardware systems have to stay on secure paths on the strings—but I think I prefer them to having a mutilated man trapped inside my ship.’…. ‘Captain, this is tissue, not a man. Don’t let shape fool you. A man is memories and purpose, but 303XT only reacts and calculates…. When it all comes together, biocomputer intuition makes them unbeatable by hardware-only systems.’
The dedicated interstices of their cocoons, the cables which sent the daily updates to eyelike biocomputers, ended at Frank Quick’s safe.
antedating 1952
Last modified 2021-01-03 18:25:30
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entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries
in OED.