Solar Bommai - A school to have Acquaintance in Engineering

🧊 Cryo-CMOS: The Cold Future of VLSI Design           As quantum computing rapidly advances, the supporting hardware must evolve accordingly. Cryogenic CMOS (Cryo-CMOS) has emerged as a critical technology, enabling classical control electronics to function at extremely low temperatures. These low-temperature electronics are essential for efficiently managing and reading quantum bits (qubits), which operate in cryogenic environments to preserve coherence. Placing CMOS-based control circuits closer to qubits minimizes signal loss, reduces latency, and enhances overall system performance.     The need for Cryo-CMOS stems from several key factors. First, traditional room-temperature electronics can't be placed near qubits due to heat interference, necessitating a cold-compatible alternative. Second, transmitting signals from room-temperature devices to cryogenic environments leads to degradation and delay. Third, integrating co...

               🌑 Why Parts of Your Processor Stay Asleep:  Understanding Dark Silicon      As semiconductor technology advances, chipmakers continue to cram billions of transistors onto a single piece of silicon. Thanks to Moore’s Law, this exponential growth in transistor density has become the norm. However, there’s a hidden limitation that’s quietly reshaping the way we design and use processors:  Dark Silicon .     In this blog, we’ll explore what dark silicon is, why it’s a problem, and how engineers are creatively working around this modern design bottleneck. What is Dark Silicon?     Dark Silicon  refers to portions of a chip that remain powered off or underutilized—not because they’re faulty, but because turning them on would exceed power or thermal limits. Real-world example:     Imagine a multicore processor with 100 cores. You might think it can r...