Principles of Low Dissipation Computing from a Stochastic Circuit Model

TL;DR

This paper presents a thermodynamically consistent stochastic model for digital logic gates, analyzing the trade-offs between accuracy, speed, and energy dissipation, and providing insights into designing low-energy computing devices.

Contribution

It introduces a minimal stochastic model for logic gates that links device architecture with thermodynamic principles, enabling analysis of low dissipation digital computing.

Findings

High accuracy requires sufficient energy and time.

Low-energy computing couples accuracy and speed depending on architecture.

The model bridges digital device engineering and stochastic thermodynamics.

Abstract

We introduce a thermodynamically consistent, minimal stochastic model for complementary logic gates built with field-effect transistors. We characterize the performance of such gates with tools from information theory and study the interplay between accuracy, speed, and dissipation of computations. With a few universal building blocks, such as the NOT and NAND gates, we are able to model arbitrary combinatorial and sequential logic circuits, which are modularized to implement computing tasks. We find generically that high accuracy can be achieved provided sufficient energy consumption and time to perform the computation. However, for low-energy computing, accuracy and speed are coupled in a way that depends on the device architecture and task. Our work bridges the gap between the engineering of low dissipation digital devices and theoretical developments in stochastic thermodynamics, and provides a platform to study design principles for low dissipation digital devices.