A universal tradeoff between power, precision and speed in physical communication

Abstract

Maximizing the speed and precision of communication while minimizing power dissipation is a fundamental engineering design goal. Also, biological systems achieve remarkable speed, precision and power efficiency using poorly understood physical design principles. Powerful theories like information theory and thermodynamics do not provide general limits on power, precision and speed. Here we go beyond these classical theories to prove that the product of precision and speed is universally bounded by power dissipation in any physical communication channel whose dynamics is faster than that of the signal. Moreover, our derivation involves a novel connection between friction and information geometry. These results may yield insight into both the engineering design of communication devices and the structure and function of biological signaling systems.

15 pages, 3 figures

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• Stochastic thermodynamic interpretation of information geometry
• Correlation-powered Information Engines and the Thermodynamics of Self-Correction
• Nonequilibrium uncertainty principle from information geometry
• Principles of Low Dissipation Computing from a Stochastic Circuit Model
• Identifying feasible operating regimes for early T-cell recognition: The speed, energy, accuracy trade-off in kinetic proofreading and adaptive sorting
• Shortcuts to Thermodynamic Computing: The Cost of Fast and Faithful Erasure