Memristive Circuit Implementation of Caenorhabditis Elegans Mechanism for Neuromorphic Computing.

Journal: IEEE transactions on neural networks and learning systems
PMID:

Abstract

To overcome the energy efficiency bottleneck of the von Neumann architecture and scaling limit of silicon transistors, an emerging but promising solution is neuromorphic computing, a new computing paradigm inspired by how biological neural networks handle the massive amount of information in a parallel and efficient way. Recently, there is a surge of interest in the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), an ideal model organism to probe the mechanisms of biological neural networks. In this article, we propose a neuron model for C. elegans with leaky integrate-and-fire (LIF) dynamics and adjustable integration time. We utilize these neurons to build the C. elegans neural network according to their neural physiology, which comprises: 1) sensory modules; 2) interneuron modules; and 3) motoneuron modules. Leveraging these block designs, we develop a serpentine robot system, which mimics the locomotion behavior of C. elegans upon external stimulus. Moreover, experimental results of C. elegans neurons presented in this article reveals the robustness (1% error w.r.t. 10% random noise) and flexibility of our design in term of parameter setting. The work paves the way for future intelligent systems by mimicking the C. elegans neural system.

Authors

  • Hegan Chen
  • Qinghui Hong
  • Zhongrui Wang
    Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.
  • Chunhua Wang
    College of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China.
  • Xiangxiang Zeng
    Department of Computer Science, Hunan University, Changsha, China.
  • Jiliang Zhang