Scientists have developed an entirely new kind of microchip that uses microwaves instead of conventional digital circuitry to perform operations.

The processor, which can perform faster than conventional CPUs, is the world's first fully functional microwave neural network (MNN) that can fit on a chip, scientists reported in a study published Aug. 14 in the journal Nature Electronics.

High-bandwidth applications, such as radar imaging, demand high-speed processing. Microwaves that operate in the analog spectrum can meet the processing needs of these applications, which is why scientists have pursued this new approach to computing.