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IBM Reveals 8-Bit Analog Chip with Phase-Change Memory

posted by martyb on Tuesday December 04 2018, @03:46AM   Printer-friendly
from the active-memory dept.

NPC-131072 writes:

IBM Reveals 8-Bit Analog Chip With Phase-Change Memory

Today at the IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting in San Francisco, IBM reported a new 8-bit analog chip. But the true development was less about analog chips catching up to their digital peers and more a radical rethink of chip architecture: this chip is the first to perform 8-bit calculations right where information is stored.

In traditional von Neumann chip architecture, data constantly shuttles between memory and processing, which consumes valuable energy and time, [...] IBM's new analog chip is based on phase-change memory. The key ingredient is a material that can undergo phase changes in response to electrical current. Typically, these are alloys of germanium, tellurium, and antimony. In one phase, which is conductive, the atoms are lined up nicely. In the other phase, which doesn't conduct electricity, the atoms move around, heated locally by current, and become jumbled.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by turgid on Tuesday December 04 2018, @03:34PM (4 children)

    by turgid (4318) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday December 04 2018, @03:34PM (#769594) Journal

    8-bit analogue? Isn't a bit a binary digit?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 04 2018, @07:34PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 04 2018, @07:34PM (#769716)

    Oxywhat ;P

    Our device uses phase-change memory (PCM) for in-memory computing. PCM records synaptic weights in its physical state along a gradient between amorphous and crystalline. The conductance of the material changes along with its physical state and can be modified using electrical pulses. This is how PCM is able to perform calculations. Because the state can be anywhere along the continuum between 0 and 1, it is considered an analog value, as opposed to a digital value, which is either a 0 or a 1, nothing in between.

    IBM Blog [ibm.com] for those wanting more detail.

    • (Score: 2) by turgid on Tuesday December 04 2018, @10:25PM (1 child)

      by turgid (4318) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday December 04 2018, @10:25PM (#769808) Journal

      Analogue digit, were there such a thing.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @12:18AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @12:18AM (#769868)

        Analogue digit, were there such a thing.

        By means of analogy, I humbly present the impudent digit to your obtuse come back.

        The data isn't stored as a digital value in this chip, think of digitisation as an ADC or using DigitalRead and Write on the analog pins of an arduino.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @11:01AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @11:01AM (#770022)

      In other words, it's an artificial neural network realized by using memristors.