ISCAS 2021 - IEEE
On May 25th 2021 our consortium partner Aarhus University - Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering presented "Flexible Energy Efficient Implementation of Adaptive Spiking Encoder for Neuromorphic Processors", a paper by Milad Zamani Margherita Ronchini Hai Au Huynh Hooman Farkhani and Farshad Moradi at ISCAS 2021 virtual conference - Neuromorphic Systems II session.
Neuromorphic computing could pave the way to a new generation of smart sensors that can process signals locally through Spiking Neural Networks (SNNs). For this paradigm to take hold, it is necessary to have an analog-to-spike encoder adaptable to a wide range of applications. The encoding system should offer the possibility to try different encoding algorithms, giving freedom to the designers to select the most appropriate approach for the target task. At the same time, it should feature a tunable parameter to modulate the spike density, in the pursuit of a compromise between accuracy and power consumption. Therefore, the goal of this work is to provide a platform enabling the conversion of analog signals to a sequence of spikes, characterized by flexibility, high energy efficiency, and small area.We introduce an encoder designed and simulated in a standard 0.18 μm CMOS process which benefits from a switch-capacitor and a dynamic comparator to achieve very high energy efficiency. The controller unit can switch between Slope-based or Step-Forward Encoding algorithms. The encoder consumes 30 fJ/spike at 1.5 V supply voltage and occupies an area of 0.00325 mm 2.
The IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (ISCAS) is the flagship conference of the IEEE Circuits and Systems (CAS) Society and the world’s premiere networking forum for researchers in the highly active fields of theory, design and implementation of circuits and systems. This is accomplished through technical conference sessions, poster sessions, live demonstration sessions, and publication of conference papers. ISCAS 2021 will be driven by the theme “Smart Technology for an Intelligent Society” aiming to emphasize the potential of the CAS Society to find multidisciplinary solutions for the societal and engineering challenges of our times.