Conference: NSF Workshop on AI + HW 2035: Shaping the Next Decade

Artificial intelligence (AI) and computing hardware (HW) are rapidly reshaping industries and research fields, but their advancement is increasingly interdependent and facing growing challenges. As AI models become larger and more complex, they place significant demands on computing infrastructure, leading to rising energy consumption and performance bottlenecks. At the same time, new hardware technologies offer exciting but underutilized potential. This project brings together top experts from universities, government, and industry in a high-impact workshop to chart a national vision for the co-evolution of AI and hardware over the next decade. By identifying pressing research questions and long-term opportunities, this effort will help guide future investments in science and technology that advance national prosperity, security, and innovation. The proposed workshop will also strengthen cross-disciplinary collaboration and help educate a new generation of researchers working at the intersection of AI and hardware.

This workshop, titled “AI + HW 2035: Shaping the Next Decade,” will define a 10-year research roadmap for the integrated advancement of artificial intelligence and hardware. The workshop will address critical technical challenges, including energy-efficient model architectures, the design of scalable and specialized accelerators, the integration of emerging devices such as analog and quantum hardware, and the automation of model-hardware co-design workflows. Specific research topics to be explored include reasoning-capable AI systems, neuro-symbolic computing, sparse and domain-specific architectures, reconfigurable dataflows for next-generation accelerators, and chiplet-based system scalability. Participants will engage in invited talks, panel discussions, and structured working sessions to collaboratively draft a comprehensive vision paper. This paper will synthesize cross-domain insights, identify strategic priorities, and recommend actionable research directions that can inform coordinated funding efforts by federal agencies and stakeholders. The workshop also aims to establish a lasting platform to bridge the AI and hardware communities, enabling sustained cross-disciplinary dialogue.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Award Number: 2535902
Principal Investigator: Deming Chen
Funds Obligated: $100,000
State: IL