Toward Lifelong-Sustainable Electronic-Photonic AI Systems via Extreme Efficiency, Reconfigurability, and Robustness

• URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2509.07396v1
• Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2025 05:20:55 GMT
• Title: Toward Lifelong-Sustainable Electronic-Photonic AI Systems via Extreme Efficiency, Reconfigurability, and Robustness
• Authors: Ziang Yin, Hongjian Zhou, Chetan Choppali Sudarshan, Vidya Chhabria, Jiaqi Gu,
• Abstract summary: Electronic-photonic integrated circuits (EPICs) offer inherent advantages in ultra-high bandwidth, low latency, and energy efficiency.<n>We show how EPDA and co-design methodologies can amplify these inherent benefits.<n>We outline a vision for lifelong-sustainable electronic-photonic AI systems.
• Score: 1.9666903722608062
• License: http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/
• Abstract: The relentless growth of large-scale artificial intelligence (AI) has created unprecedented demand for computational power, straining the energy, bandwidth, and scaling limits of conventional electronic platforms. Electronic-photonic integrated circuits (EPICs) have emerged as a compelling platform for next-generation AI systems, offering inherent advantages in ultra-high bandwidth, low latency, and energy efficiency for computing and interconnection. Beyond performance, EPICs also hold unique promises for sustainability. Fabricated in relaxed process nodes with fewer metal layers and lower defect densities, photonic devices naturally reduce embodied carbon footprint (CFP) compared to advanced digital electronic integrated circuits, while delivering orders-of-magnitude higher computing performance and interconnect bandwidth. To further advance the sustainability of photonic AI systems, we explore how electronic-photonic design automation (EPDA) and cross-layer co-design methodologies can amplify these inherent benefits. We present how advanced EPDA tools enable more compact layout generation, reducing both chip area and metal layer usage. We will also demonstrate how cross-layer device-circuit-architecture co-design unlocks new sustainability gains for photonic hardware: ultra-compact photonic circuit designs that minimize chip area cost, reconfigurable hardware topology that adapts to evolving AI workloads, and intelligent resilience mechanisms that prolong lifetime by tolerating variations and faults. By uniting intrinsic photonic efficiency with EPDA- and co-design-driven gains in area efficiency, reconfigurability, and robustness, we outline a vision for lifelong-sustainable electronic-photonic AI systems. This perspective highlights how EPIC AI systems can simultaneously meet the performance demands of modern AI and the urgent imperative for sustainable computing.

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