Chip Proccess and Classification

 Impressive speed for detecting and classifying images

Chip Processes, Classifies Nearly Two Billion Images per Second

Penn Engineering Today

Melissa Pappas, June 1, 2022

University of Pennsylvania (Penn) engineers have designed a 9.3-square-millimeter chip that can detect and classify images in less than a nanosecond. The chip directly processes light received from objects of interest using an optical deep neural network. "Our chip processes information through what we call 'computation-by-propagation,' meaning that unlike clock-based systems, computations occur as light propagates through the chip," explained Penn's Firooz Aflatouni. "We are also skipping the step of converting optical signals to electrical signals because our chip can read and process optical signals directly, and both of these changes make our chip a significantly faster technology." Penn's Farshid Ashtiani said direct processing of optical signals makes a large memory unit unnecessary. ...