Researchers reinvent tech.

This article focuses on developments related to the field of information technology. Enterprise and academic systems are equally challenged by thickening jungles of system complexity and massive flows of data. Research facilities are also IT customers as well as innovators, with technical sophistication that often leads to early adoption and provides potential lessons learned that may benefit less aggressive sites. Mere continuation of the Moore's Law trend to greater physical density of devices is not an attractive option, even if it were physically possible. The Internet itself demonstrates this general approach as its packet-based communication relies on connection and transfer protocols, such as TCP/IP and Ethernet, that are designed to function "well enough" rather than requiring perfection to function at all. Enterprise buyers should be increasingly prepared to discuss their tolerance for error rates and variabilities in system performance, rather than expecting single-valued measures of performance in system specifications. Not merely in metaphor but also in direct application, biology and biochemistry may contribute to the creation of IT hardware.