Rainbow chip may reduce AI energy demands- Here is what engineers created

Engineers to build a chip that fires a rainbow of powerful laser beams. (Image: MirageC)

Researchers have managed to create a novel chip. This chip can produce the range of laser beams, each of which corresponds to a specific optical frequency. This is a surprising innovation that can greatly enhance information transfer applications in artificial intelligence.

The chip is designed in such a way that many data streams can be transferred at a time. The system is able to use each optical frequency a separate data channel and therefore handle huge amount of information compared to the traditional single color fiber optics.

As the workloads of AI double and triple, faster and energy-efficient AI-related solutions are needed in the data centers. The innovation will map out energy requirements of AI technologies, as it will enhance the speed and efficiency of data transfer making one of the major challenges of the new computing infrastructure.

The chip is a single chip that provides an industrial quality laser source together with a complex optical circuit which geometrically shapes and stabilizes the light. It then divides the light into uniformly gaping color bands which can handle separate data streams independently.

Scientists think that the technology may be a game-changer to AI and other high-performance computing models. The rainbow chip can bring more efficient computing systems by cutting down on data transmission.

This will be more green, faster and scalable. Commercial adoption needs further test and scaling. The discovery points to the possibility of photonics being able to serve increased needs of advanced computing.