🎓 Started my Science Communicator Residency at @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social’s @simonsinstitute.bsky.social! I'm learning how advances in matrix multiplication shape the future of AI and turning it into a mini documentary.
🎥 A peek into my first day:

Prof. Williams now studies what happens when speed runs out.
Her field, fine-grained complexity, shows how close we are to the limits of computation and why some problems resist every shortcut.
#SimonsLive

Nearly everything in modern computing depends on matrix multiplication, and researchers are still chasing the fastest way to do it.
Virginia Vassilevska Williams helped break that speed record, then turned to understanding why some barriers can’t be broken at all.
@simonsinstitute.bsky.social

Avoiding unnecessary data movement saves energy too! Holtz showed how communication-avoiding algorithms can find a sweet spot where less motion —> lower energy use and without slowing computation.
@SimonsInstitute #SimonsLive

‪Most of a computer’s effort isn’t doing math, it’s moving data, aka every trip between memory & processor = costs in time & power ‬
‪This is the communication cost, a framework researchers use to measure and reduce that hidden expense.‬
‪from Olga Holtz @SimonsInstitute #SimonsLive‬

How to make matrix multiplication practical

Mathematically:

- shrink the exponents and constants that set its speed

Hardware:

- move data less
- handle smaller chunks more efficiently

(from Oded Schwartz) @SimonsInstitute #SimonsLive