Challenges Grow For Modeling Auto Performance, Power


Rising complexity in automobiles is creating huge challenges about how to add more safety and comfort features and electronics into vehicles without reducing the overall range they can travel or pricing them so high that only the rich can afford them. While the current focus is on modeling hardware and software to understand interactions between systems, this remains a huge challenge. It req... » read more

AI Power Consumption Exploding


Machine learning is on track to consume all the energy being supplied, a model that is costly, inefficient, and unsustainable. To a large extent, this is because the field is new, exciting, and rapidly growing. It is being designed to break new ground in terms of accuracy or capability. Today, that means bigger models and larger training sets, which require exponential increases in processin... » read more

New Uses For AI In Chips


Artificial intelligence is being deployed across a number of new applications, from improving performance and reducing power in a wide range of end devices to spotting irregularities in data movement for security reasons. While most people are familiar with using machine learning and deep learning to distinguish between cats and dogs, emerging applications show how this capability can be use... » read more

Cryogenic CMOS Becomes Cool


Cryogenic CMOS is a technology on the cusp, promising higher performance and lower power with no change in fabrication technology. The question now is whether it becomes viable and mainstream. Technologies often appear to be just on the horizon, not quite making it, but never too far out of sight. That's usually because some issue plagues it, and the incentive is not big enough to solve the ... » read more

Tradeoffs In Archiving Data


If you’ve ever had to sort through old technical documents, wondering what still has value and what can be safely tossed, you can identify with the quandary of Thomas Levy, UCSD professor of anthropology and co-founder of the field of cyber-archaeology. Staring at thousands of pieces of pottery in a Jordanian dessert, he erred on the side of keeping it all. “My personal perspective when ... » read more

Design And Security Challenges for VR


Virtual reality is no longer just for gamers, and as this technology is deployed in everything from health care to industrial training, the requirements for processing more data faster over a high-speed connection are growing. Designing these devices continues to be a study in contradictions. They must be extremely low power, with a small enough batteries to make them comfortable to wear. Bu... » read more

How Overlay Keeps Pace With EUV Patterning


Overlay metrology tools improve accuracy while delivering acceptable throughput, addressing competing requirements in increasingly complex devices. In a race that never ends, on-product overlay tolerances for leading-edge devices are shrinking rapidly. They are in the single-digit nanometer range for the 3nm generation (22nm metal pitch) devices. New overlay targets, machine learning, and im... » read more

Nanosheet FETs Drive Changes In Metrology And Inspection


In the Moore’s Law world, it has become a truism that smaller nodes lead to larger problems. As fabs turn to nanosheet transistors, it is becoming increasingly challenging to detect line-edge roughness and other defects due to the depths and opacities of these and other multi-layered structures. As a result, metrology is taking even more of a hybrid approach, with some well-known tools moving... » read more

Making The Most Of Data Lakes


Having all the semiconductor data available is increasingly necessary for improving manufacturability, yield, and ultimately the reliability of end devices. But without sufficient knowledge of relationships between data from different processes and computationally efficient data structures, the value of any data is significantly reduced. In the semiconductor industry, reducing waste, decreas... » read more

Where Are The Autonomous Cars?


Are we there yet? Governments, consumers, and engineers alike want to know how close the automotive world is to producing a fully autonomous Level 5 vehicle. While some experts say such vehicles could hit the road in the next few years, they're a shrinking minority. Most forecasts say a truly self-driving car is at least a decade away — and maybe much longer, because it requires disruptive... » read more

← Older posts Newer posts →