Chip and Package-Scale Interconnects for General-Purpose, Domain-Specific, and Quantum Computing Systems—Overview, Challenges, and Opportunities

Abstract

The anticipated end of Moore’s law, coupled with the breakdown of Dennard scaling, compelled everyone to conceive forthcoming computing systems once transistors reach their limits. Three leading approaches to circumvent this situation are the chiplet paradigm, domain customisation and quantum computing. However, architectural and technological innovations have shifted the fundamental bottleneck from computation to communication. Hence, on-chip and on-package communication play a pivotal role in determining the performance, energy efficiency and scalability of general-purpose, domain-specific and quantum computing systems. This article reviews the recent advances in chip and package-scale interconnects due to the change in architecture, application and technology. The primary objective of this article is to present the current status, key challenges, and impact-worthy opportunities in this research area from the perspective of hardware architectures. The secondary objective of this article is to serve as a tutorial providing an overview of academic and industrial explorations in chip and package-scale communication infrastructure design for general-purpose, domain-specific and quantum computing systems.