Researchers Develop Dense 3D Chip for AI Processing

Researchers at Stanford, MIT, and other universities unveiled a new, monolithic 3D processor that could help solve one of the biggest problems facing chipmakers: the processor-memory performance gap. Working with a commercial foundry, the researchers say they've created a 3D chip that shows massive performance improvements over 2D designs.

When chipmakers design 2D processors, they face components that handle data too quickly for memory to keep up. That's typically because, in a 2D setting, it's difficult to get enough memory close to the processor in such a way that the data can be transferred quickly enough to keep the processor working at its maximum speeds. The result is a data bottleneck.

Chipmakers have various means of reducing that bottleneck, including small caches of memory onboard the processor. They provide limited memory, which the processor can access faster than it can communicate with the larger memory modules on ...