The Mandelbrot set is — when visualized with some colors — an interesting shape with infinite detail. While the patterns are immediately obvious to the human eye, anyone who’s run one can tell you ...

In the mid-1980s, like Walkman cassette players and tie-dyed shirts, the buglike silhouette of the Mandelbrot set was everywhere. Students plastered it to dorm room walls around the world.

When faced with an FPGA, some people might use it to visualize the Mandelbrot set. Others might use it to make CPUs. But what happens if you combine the two? [Michael Kohn] shows us what happens with ...