Keynote

Abstract

This talk will present a decade of research on unlocking the full potential of 3D NAND flash storage through cross-layer optimization. As flash storage now dominates data center capacity, the industry faces a fundamental scaling trilemma where higher density simultaneously degrades reliability, performance, and lifetime. The research path begins with deep physical characterization, establishing that accurate understanding of device behavior, including retention, read disturb, and wear, must be the foundation of any optimization. Building on these insights, the work progresses to read performance optimization, exploiting error asymmetry and using designated cells as reliability indicators to achieve near-zero read retry rates. The research then demonstrates that smart data encoding can transform how data interacts with flash physics, turning invalidated data and entropy-aware coding into tools for extending device lifetime. We also challenges the long-held constraint of sequential page programming, showing that strategic reprogramming can fundamentally reshape the write path for significant latency gains. Throughout this progression, the unifying principle is cross-layer co-design: by allowing information to flow between device physics, flash chips, controllers, and applications, it becomes possible to push the Pareto frontier on reliability, performance, and lifetime simultaneously rather than trading one for another. Most recently, we explore the usage of Flash memory in the memory hierarchy of ML inference systems. A preliminary study on HBF will be presented.

Biography

Prof. Chun Jason Xue is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Dallas in 2007 and spent 16 years at the City University of Hong Kong before joining MBZUAI in 2024. Professor Xue was elected IEEE Fellow, Class of 2026, for his contributions to optimizing the performance of non-volatile memory storage systems, and is also an ACM Distinguished Member.

His foundational research on non-volatile memories, addressing read/write asymmetry and write calibration, has influenced commercial products including Intel 3D XPoint memory. He has received numerous awards including the ACM Euro Award (2024), IEEE NVMSA Best Paper Award (2023), and ACM HotStorage Best Paper Award (2021).