[dqh]

I work on the software stack for a biological computing platform (think: tool for programming with human neurons in a dish).

Coding work spans FPGA (SystemVerilog), Linux kernel C, userspace C, Python, and yes, some web services and Browser JavaScript also. I also work on the network engineering of the cloud service and on the Linux OS image.

Easily the most fun I’ve had as a developer and I’ve worked on lots of different types of commercial software projects before. Not all the world is web apps, embedded work can be very satisfying if you’ve not considered it.

[Gooblebrai]

Can you expand more on how the tools tie with the biological part? This is very interesting!

[dqh]

The neurons live on an electrode array kept inside a machine which keeps them alive (body temperature, sugar, gas, etc). The embedded system continually measures the voltage at each electrode, and can electrically stimulate the neurons via the same.

Users are provided with an easy to use Python API that allows realtime observation of the raw signals and of detected action potentials (spikes). They can also execute precisely controlled stimulation sequences, which allows information to be presented to the neurons. Then there are a lot of higher level application APIs to handle things like recording data, real-time visualisation, and experiment config management.

Why: it appears to be possible to teach neurons to perform tasks (we taught some to play pong several years ago). Since then our focus has been on building a system that enables rapid iteration in this sort of research. We're selling the system to organisations that have the appropriate biology skills, and renting access to hosted devices where we provide and take care of the cells.