AI-designed chips are so weird that 'humans cannot really understand them'

[Chip (OP)]

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AI-designed chips are so weird that 'humans cannot really understand them' — but they perform better than anything we've created

Published yesterday on Feb 21, 2025

Engineering researchers have demonstrated that artificial intelligence (AI) can design complex wireless chips in hours, a feat that would have taken humans weeks to complete.

Not only did the chip designs prove more efficient, the AI took a radically different approach — one that a human circuit designer would have been highly unlikely to devise. The researchers outlined their findings in a study published Dec. 30 2024 in the journal Nature Communications.

The research focused on millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) wireless chips, which present some of the biggest challenges facing manufacturers due to their complexity and need for miniaturization. These chips are used in 5G modems, now commonly found in phones.

Manufacturers currently rely on a mix of human expertise, bespoke circuit designs and established templates. Each new design then goes through a slow process of optimization, based on trial and error because it is often so complex that a human cannot fully understand what is happening inside the chip. This leads to a cautious, iterative approach based on what has worked before.

The AI treated the chip design as one complete system rather than a collection of parts. (Image credit: Princeton University)