Old Computer Mystery Solved With New Technology

By:Leonard Richard

Specialists at Mary Greeley Medical Center were called in Tuesday to help solve a mystery for some Ames Laboratory and Iowa State University researchers.

The specialists did imaging of an original drum from the Atanasoff-Berry Computer, the first electronic digital computer.

The imaging techniques helped the researchers "see" what was inside of the drum. ISU and Ames Lab researchers are building a working replica of the ABC. The original was built from 1939-42, and little detailed documentation of the invention remains.

"We're going to learn an awful lot from this," said Dave Birlingmair, a mechanical principal investigator on the replica project.

"We want to get this background information on the building of it so that we can build a replica that's as identical as we can make it," he added.

The drum, which was loaned to ISU from the Smithsonian, was actually built by Cliff Berry in the Physics Building at ISU, Birlingmair said.

The drum underwent various imaging methods, including x-ray, computerized axial tomography (CAT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

The tests were helpful in gaining new information for the researchers, and to confirm some of their guesses, Birlingmair said.

"We saw how the connections were made inside the drum, and we found a counterweight that's in there for balance," Birlingmair said. "We also verified some things that we expected to be there."

All the researchers knew for sure about the drum before the tests was that it was filled with capacitors and beeswax, he said.

"Now we have all of the basic information and materials to get started on a working replica," he said.

The university has already built a non-working replica of the drum, which is located in the lobby of Durham Center, but that was built from visual observations only and has nothing inside of it, Birlingmair said. "This one will be much more true to reality," he said.

The original drum has to be returned to the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., next week because it is being used for a large computer display there.

The researchers did manage to get videotape and still photos of the inside of the drum from the imaging processes on Tuesday, Birlingmair said.

"That's going to be a big help because we will have those as a reference from now on," he said. "We really want to get it as close to the original as we can."

Researchers hope to have the replica built by the end of this year, researchers said.

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