Memriwhat?

News around the discovery/invention at HP of the memristor has finally tipped my WTF scale into the red. Any article that uses words like “memristor” (apparently the 4th, long postulated, passive component type in electric circuit theory) and “hysteresis” (the phenomenon that causes the memristor to function) is automatically going to probably show up on the radar. But when they start comparing the discovery to the replacement of Aristotle’s Law of Motion with Netwon’s work, it goes well over the top.

I’m not into electronics in the sense that I solder or build circuit boards. I vaguely remember being in an “electronics” course when I was in grade school in 4H, for all of about a month. I’ve also done some wiring on my house, putting in circuit breakers and whatnot. Beyond that, I’m completely ignorant of circuits, how they work, or what the hell this is. But when they start talking about the problems that it solves, I have some idea of how important this could be. Heat/energy have become more and more significant problems as microprocessors have gotten smaller/faster. Storing more information in smaller and smaller spaces is getting more difficult. Apparently, the memristor has applications in these spaces, as well as many many others. Apparently, its like we just found out about a new force of nature, a new fundamental particle, or a new driver for evolution.