Chinese team creates world’s first AI training system that runs entirely on light
- Taichi-II chip is fully optical and significantly boosts efficiency and performance, according to Tsinghua University scientists
The Taichi-II chip was created by a Tsinghua University team led by professors Fang Lu and Dai Qionghai, whose study was published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.
Training artificial intelligence using the Taichi chip requires the assistance of electronic computers. But Taichi-II can be used for modelling and training based entirely on light – and that has made it much more efficient and improved performance, according to the team.
They said in the paper that the upgrade was a key step for optical computing and could help to take it from the theoretical stage to large-scale experimental applications, as well as address the growing demand for computational power with low energy consumption.
It could also provide an alternative after the US restricted China’s access to the most powerful graphics processing unit, or GPU, chips for AI training.
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