Hardware Trends Impacting Floating-Point Computations In Scientific Applications
Abstract
The evolution of floating-point computation has been shaped by algorithmic advancements, architectural innovations, and the increasing computational demands of modern technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC). This paper examines the historical progression of floating-point computation in scientific applications and contextualizes recent trends driven by AI, particularly the adoption of reduced-precision floating-point types. The challenges posed by these trends, including the trade-offs between performance, efficiency, and precision, are discussed, as are innovations in mixed-precision computing and emulation algorithms that offer solutions to these challenges. This paper also explores architectural shifts, including the role of specialized and general-purpose hardware, and how these trends will influence future advancements in scientific computing, energy efficiency, and system design.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2411.12090,
title = {Hardware Trends Impacting Floating-Point Computations In Scientific Applications},
author = {Jack Dongarra and John Gunnels and Harun Bayraktar and Azzam Haidar and Dan Ernst},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2411.12090},
year = {2024}
}