Chameleon: a Heterogeneous and Disaggregated Accelerator System for Retrieval-Augmented Language Models
On the map: Retrieval-augmented generation → RAG pipeline design and evaluation
Abstract (arXiv)
A Retrieval-Augmented Language Model (RALM) combines a large language model (LLM) with a vector database to retrieve context-specific knowledge during text generation. This strategy facilitates impressive generation quality even with smaller models, thus reducing computational demands by orders of magnitude. To serve RALMs efficiently and flexibly, we propose Chameleon, a heterogeneous accelerator system integrating both LLM and vector search accelerators in a disaggregated architecture. The heterogeneity ensures efficient serving for both inference and retrieval, while the disaggregation allows independent scaling of LLM and vector search accelerators to fulfill diverse RALM requirements. Our Chameleon prototype implements vector search accelerators on FPGAs and assigns LLM inference to GPUs, with CPUs as cluster coordinators. Evaluated on various RALMs, Chameleon exhibits up to 2.16× reduction in latency and 3.18x speedup in throughput compared to the hybrid CPU-GPU architecture. The promising results pave the way for adopting heterogeneous accelerators for not only LLM inference but also vector search in future RALM systems.
Key facts. Cited by 23 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in RAG pipeline design and evaluation, one of 15 directions in Retrieval-augmented generation. Builds on 60 of its 158 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 15 Oct 2023.
Builds on
60 of 158 references.
References · 60
- 2017Attention Is All You Needcited by 59,932
- 2018BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understandingcited by 40,204
- 2020Language Models are Few-Shot Learnerscited by 32,199
- 2019PyTorch: An Imperative Style, High-Performance Deep Learning Librarycited by 20,160
- 2019Exploring the Limits of Transfer Learning with a Unified Text-to-Text Transformercited by 14,491
- 2020Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Knowledge-Intensive NLP Taskscited by 9,160
- 2023Efficient Memory Management for Large Language Model Serving with PagedAttentioncited by 5,767
- 2022PaLM: Scaling Language Modeling with Pathwayscited by 5,304
- 2017Billion-scale similarity search with GPUscited by 2,477
- 2015Deep Compression: Compressing Deep Neural Networks with Pruning, Trained Quantization and Huffman Codingcited by 2,291
- 2020Extracting Training Data from Large Language Modelscited by 2,144
- 2020REALM: Retrieval-Augmented Language Model Pre-Trainingcited by 2,126
38 more
- 2022GPTQ: Accurate Post-Training Quantization for Generative Pre-trained Transformerscited by 1,838
- 2019fairseq: A Fast, Extensible Toolkit for Sequence Modelingcited by 1,486
- 2019ZeRO: Memory Optimizations Toward Training Trillion Parameter Modelscited by 1,278
- 2021Improving language models by retrieving from trillions of tokenscited by 1,278
- 2020Leveraging Passage Retrieval with Generative Models for Open Domain Question Answeringcited by 1,203
- 2021Scaling Language Models: Methods, Analysis & Insights from Training Gophercited by 1,199
- 2019Machine Unlearningcited by 1,020
- 2021Ethical and social risks of harm from Language Modelscited by 957
- 2022Atlas: Few-shot Learning with Retrieval Augmented Language Modelscited by 940
- 2016Efficient and robust approximate nearest neighbor search using Hierarchical Navigable Small World graphscited by 853
- 2019Generalization through Memorization: Nearest Neighbor Language Modelscited by 788
- 2023In-Context Retrieval-Augmented Language Modelscited by 694
- 2017In-Datacenter Performance Analysis of a Tensor Processing Unitcited by 610
- 2022Using DeepSpeed and Megatron to Train Megatron-Turing NLG 530B, A Large-Scale Generative Language Modelcited by 557
- 2021Internet-Augmented Dialogue Generationcited by 217
- 2020Nearest Neighbor Machine Translationcited by 209
- 2020When Machine Unlearning Jeopardizes Privacycited by 181
- 2020Data Movement Is All You Need: A Case Study on Optimizing Transformerscited by 108
- 2017Fast Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search With The Navigating Spreading-out Graphcited by 103
- 2022Language Models that Seek for Knowledge: Modular Search & Generation for Dialogue and Prompt Completioncited by 102
- 2020A3: Accelerating Attention Mechanisms in Neural Networks with Approximationcited by 97
- 2020Pre-training via Paraphrasingcited by 92
- 2021Adaptive Semiparametric Language Modelscited by 83
- 2021End-to-End Training of Neural Retrievers for Open-Domain Question Answeringcited by 75
- 2022Neuro-Symbolic Language Modeling with Automaton-augmented Retrievalcited by 60
- 2023InstructRetro: Instruction Tuning post Retrieval-Augmented Pretrainingcited by 53
- 2021Fast Nearest Neighbor Machine Translationcited by 37
- 2021RecSSD: Near Data Processing for Solid State Drive Based Recommendation Inferencecited by 35
- 2021SPANN: Highly-efficient Billion-scale Approximate Nearest Neighbor Searchcited by 35
- 2023Why do Nearest Neighbor Language Models Work?cited by 29
- 2023High-Dimensional Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search: with Reliable and Efficient Distance Comparison Operationscited by 25
- 2022Decoupled Context Processing for Context Augmented Language Modelingcited by 24
- 2023The Dark Side of ChatGPT: Legal and Ethical Challenges from Stochastic Parrots and Hallucinationcited by 23
- 2021LightSeq2: Accelerated Training for Transformer-based Models on GPUscited by 19
- 2023High-Throughput Vector Similarity Search in Knowledge Graphscited by 19
- 2022TPU-KNN: K Nearest Neighbor Search at Peak FLOP/scited by 18
- 2022Efficient Quantized Sparse Matrix Operations on Tensor Corescited by 16
- 2022CFU Playground: Full-Stack Open-Source Framework for Tiny Machine Learning (tinyML) Acceleration on FPGAscited by 11
50 most cited of 60 All 60 (JSON)
Built on by
Citing papers per year: 2024: 4; 2025: 14; 2026: 5.
23 papers.
Sort:
By area:
- 2024A Survey on Retrieval-Augmented Text Generation for Large Language Modelscited by 77
- 2025In-depth Analysis of Graph-based RAG in a Unified Frameworkcited by 45
- 2024PipeRAG: Fast Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Algorithm-System Co-designcited by 28
- 2025RAGO: Systematic Performance Optimization for Retrieval-Augmented Generation Servingcited by 18
- 2025TeleRAG: Efficient Retrieval-Augmented Generation Inference with Lookahead Retrievalcited by 9
- 2025ContextPilot: Fast Long-Context Inference via Context Reusecited by 8
- 2024CANDY: A Benchmark for Continuous Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search with Dynamic Data Ingestioncited by 4
- 2025Balancing the Blend: An Experimental Analysis of Trade-offs in Hybrid Searchcited by 4
- 2025MIRAGE: Misleading Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Black-box and Query-agnostic Poisoning Attackscited by 4
- 2026Memory Grafting: Scaling Language Model Pre-training via Offline Conditional Memorycited by 4
- 2025VectorLiteRAG: Latency-Aware and Fine-Grained Resource Partitioning for Efficient RAGcited by 3
- 2025HedraRAG: Coordinating LLM Generation and Database Retrieval in Heterogeneous RAG Servingcited by 3
11 more
- 2025RAGDoll: Efficient Offloading-based Online RAG System on a Single GPUcited by 2
- 2025Cosmos: A CXL-Based Full In-Memory System for Approximate Nearest Neighbor Searchcited by 2
- 2026Multi-Segment Attention: Enabling Efficient KV-Cache Management for Faster Large Language Model Servingcited by 2
- 2025LoopServe: An Adaptive Dual-phase LLM Inference Acceleration System for Multi-Turn Dialoguescited by 1
- 2025PerCache: Predictive Hierarchical Cache for RAG Applications on Mobile Devicescited by 1
- 2024UpANNS: Enhancing Billion-Scale ANNS Efficiency with Real-World PIM Architecturecited by 0
- 2025Harmonia: End-to-End RAG Serving Optimizationcited by 0
- 2025All-in-one Graph-based Indexing for Hybrid Search on GPUscited by 0
- 2026SmoothAgent: Efficient Long-Horizon LLM-Based Agent Serving with Lookahead Context Engineeringcited by 0
- 2026RAG-Stack: Co-Optimizing RAG Serving Performance and Qualitycited by 0
- 2026RAGMark: A Comprehensive Framework for Benchmarking Retrieval-Augmented Generation Systemscited by 0
- 2026RAGMark: A Comprehensive Framework for Benchmarking Retrieval-Augmented Generation Systems4 Sep 2026
- 2026RAG-Stack: Co-Optimizing RAG Serving Performance and Quality4 Aug 2026
- 2026SmoothAgent: Efficient Long-Horizon LLM-Based Agent Serving with Lookahead Context Engineering30 Jun 2026
- 2026Multi-Segment Attention: Enabling Efficient KV-Cache Management for Faster Large Language Model Serving1 Jun 2026
- 2026Memory Grafting: Scaling Language Model Pre-training via Offline Conditional Memory20 May 2026
- 2025PerCache: Predictive Hierarchical Cache for RAG Applications on Mobile Devices10 Dec 2025
- 2025MIRAGE: Misleading Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Black-box and Query-agnostic Poisoning Attacks9 Dec 2025
- 2025ContextPilot: Fast Long-Context Inference via Context Reuse5 Nov 2025
- 2025All-in-one Graph-based Indexing for Hybrid Search on GPUs2 Nov 2025
- 2025Balancing the Blend: An Experimental Analysis of Trade-offs in Hybrid Search2 Aug 2025
- 2025LoopServe: An Adaptive Dual-phase LLM Inference Acceleration System for Multi-Turn Dialogues18 Jul 2025
- 2025HedraRAG: Coordinating LLM Generation and Database Retrieval in Heterogeneous RAG Serving12 Jul 2025
11 more
- 2025Cosmos: A CXL-Based Full In-Memory System for Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search22 May 2025
- 2025Harmonia: End-to-End RAG Serving Optimization1 May 2025
- 2025RAGDoll: Efficient Offloading-based Online RAG System on a Single GPU17 Apr 2025
- 2025VectorLiteRAG: Latency-Aware and Fine-Grained Resource Partitioning for Efficient RAG11 Apr 2025
- 2025RAGO: Systematic Performance Optimization for Retrieval-Augmented Generation Serving18 Mar 2025
- 2025In-depth Analysis of Graph-based RAG in a Unified Framework6 Mar 2025
- 2025TeleRAG: Efficient Retrieval-Augmented Generation Inference with Lookahead Retrieval28 Feb 2025
- 2024UpANNS: Enhancing Billion-Scale ANNS Efficiency with Real-World PIM Architecture31 Oct 2024
- 2024CANDY: A Benchmark for Continuous Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search with Dynamic Data Ingestion28 Jun 2024
- 2024A Survey on Retrieval-Augmented Text Generation for Large Language Models17 Apr 2024
- 2024PipeRAG: Fast Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Algorithm-System Co-design8 Mar 2024
- 2024A Survey on Retrieval-Augmented Text Generation for Large Language Modelscited by 77
- 2025In-depth Analysis of Graph-based RAG in a Unified Frameworkcited by 45
- 2024PipeRAG: Fast Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Algorithm-System Co-designcited by 28
- 2025RAGO: Systematic Performance Optimization for Retrieval-Augmented Generation Servingcited by 18
- 2025TeleRAG: Efficient Retrieval-Augmented Generation Inference with Lookahead Retrievalcited by 9
- 2025Balancing the Blend: An Experimental Analysis of Trade-offs in Hybrid Searchcited by 4
- 2025MIRAGE: Misleading Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Black-box and Query-agnostic Poisoning Attackscited by 4
- 2025VectorLiteRAG: Latency-Aware and Fine-Grained Resource Partitioning for Efficient RAGcited by 3
- 2025HedraRAG: Coordinating LLM Generation and Database Retrieval in Heterogeneous RAG Servingcited by 3
- 2025RAGDoll: Efficient Offloading-based Online RAG System on a Single GPUcited by 2
- 2025Cosmos: A CXL-Based Full In-Memory System for Approximate Nearest Neighbor Searchcited by 2
- 2025PerCache: Predictive Hierarchical Cache for RAG Applications on Mobile Devicescited by 1
12 most cited of 17 All 17 (JSON)
- 2026RAGMark: A Comprehensive Framework for Benchmarking Retrieval-Augmented Generation Systems4 Sep 2026
- 2026RAG-Stack: Co-Optimizing RAG Serving Performance and Quality4 Aug 2026
- 2025PerCache: Predictive Hierarchical Cache for RAG Applications on Mobile Devices10 Dec 2025
- 2025MIRAGE: Misleading Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Black-box and Query-agnostic Poisoning Attacks9 Dec 2025
- 2025All-in-one Graph-based Indexing for Hybrid Search on GPUs2 Nov 2025
- 2025Balancing the Blend: An Experimental Analysis of Trade-offs in Hybrid Search2 Aug 2025
- 2025HedraRAG: Coordinating LLM Generation and Database Retrieval in Heterogeneous RAG Serving12 Jul 2025
- 2025Cosmos: A CXL-Based Full In-Memory System for Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search22 May 2025
- 2025Harmonia: End-to-End RAG Serving Optimization1 May 2025
- 2025RAGDoll: Efficient Offloading-based Online RAG System on a Single GPU17 Apr 2025
- 2025VectorLiteRAG: Latency-Aware and Fine-Grained Resource Partitioning for Efficient RAG11 Apr 2025
- 2025RAGO: Systematic Performance Optimization for Retrieval-Augmented Generation Serving18 Mar 2025
12 newest of 17 All 17 (JSON)
- 2025ContextPilot: Fast Long-Context Inference via Context Reusecited by 8
- 2026Multi-Segment Attention: Enabling Efficient KV-Cache Management for Faster Large Language Model Servingcited by 2
- 2025LoopServe: An Adaptive Dual-phase LLM Inference Acceleration System for Multi-Turn Dialoguescited by 1
- 2026SmoothAgent: Efficient Long-Horizon LLM-Based Agent Serving with Lookahead Context Engineeringcited by 0
- 2026SmoothAgent: Efficient Long-Horizon LLM-Based Agent Serving with Lookahead Context Engineering30 Jun 2026
- 2026Multi-Segment Attention: Enabling Efficient KV-Cache Management for Faster Large Language Model Serving1 Jun 2026
- 2025ContextPilot: Fast Long-Context Inference via Context Reuse5 Nov 2025
- 2025LoopServe: An Adaptive Dual-phase LLM Inference Acceleration System for Multi-Turn Dialogues18 Jul 2025
Similar, not cited
Close in wording, no citation either way
- 2026Understand and Accelerate Memory Processing Pipeline for Large Language Model Inference
- 2024Accelerating Retrieval-Augmented Generation
- 2024JORA: JAX Tensor-Parallel LoRA Library for Retrieval Augmented Fine-Tuning
- 2024GUIDE: A Global Unified Inference Engine for Deploying Large Language Models in Heterogeneous Environments
- 2025AtlasKV: Augmenting LLMs with Billion-Scale Knowledge Graphs in 20GB VRAM
- 2024Large Language Model Inference Acceleration: A Comprehensive Hardware Perspective
- 2025HexGen-2: Disaggregated Generative Inference of LLMs in Heterogeneous Environment
- 2025REIS: A High-Performance and Energy-Efficient Retrieval System with In-Storage Processing