World-first technology is being developed by Australian scientists, offering a radical new approach to artificial intelligence.
The breakthrough could make computers run faster, turning down the heat on data centres.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Sydney scientists develop cryogenic cooling for AI
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“The hotter artificial intelligence gets, the colder our computers may need to become,” said David Reilly from Emergence Quantum.
“If you cool computers, then they run faster, significantly faster.”
Inside a lab at the University of Sydney, physicists are cooling technology to temperatures colder than anything found naturally on Earth.
“Very similar to what’s used in conventional refrigerators, but in this case we use gases that allow you to go to even lower temperatures,” Emergence Quantum’s Thomas Ohki said.
“That’s important because it means that you’re not having to then move that huge amount of water,” added Reilly. “I think it really opens up the prospect of doing something here that becomes a world first.”
Researchers believe this could eventually mean AI infrastructure needs far less water and potentially less power, changing where these giant centres can be built.
“That definitely opens up the opportunity to imagine large-scale data centres in regional areas, close to renewable energy, where both the cryogenics is used to store as well as extract heat from processes,” Reilly said.
The science is happening here, but the real test will be whether it can leave the lab and take on the enormous scale of Australia’s future data centres.
“By being able to diversify our economy by creating whole new industries, it can be incredibly valuable to us,” said Julie Cairney from the University of Sydney.
