If Vigoda's approach proves out, it could lead to future phones that use a fraction of the power of today's models, while enabling much greater use of available bandwidth. And this advantage would also apply to radios for wireless Internet access and ultra-low-power remote sensors. "Ten times savings in power means the longevity of the battery is now ten times greater," he says.

Jonathan Mills, professor of computer science at Indiana University, says that Vigoda is not the first to develop analog devices that can perform the computational work typically done with digital components, but that his work "has a strong place in current investigations into non-digital paradigms for computing," in part, because Vigoda is working on a project with clear commercial potential.

"Ben [Vigoda] is capitalizing on the excellent property of analog: that it cuts out some of these computational paths that use power and cost speed, so what he's doing has vast potential," Mills says.