Neuromorphic electronic engineering takes its inspiration fromthe functioning of nervous systems to build more power efficientelectronic sensors and processors. Event-based neuromorphic systemsare inspired by the brain's efficient data-driven communicationdesign, which is key to its quick responses and remarkablecapabilities. This cross-disciplinary text establishes howcircuit building blocks are combined in architectures to constructcomplete systems. These include vision and auditory sensors as wellas neuronal processing and learning circuits that implement modelsof nervous systems.
Techniques for building multi-chip scalable systems areconsidered throughout the book, including methods for dealing withtransistor mismatch, extensive discussions of communication andinterfacing, and making systems that operate in the real world. Thebook also provides historical context that helps relate thearchitectures and circuits to each other and that guides readers tothe extensive literature. Chapters are written by founding expertsand have been extensively edited for overall coherence.
This pioneering text is an indispensable resource for practicingneuromorphic electronic engineers, advanced electrical engineeringand computer science students and researchers interested inneuromorphic systems.
Key features:
* Summarises the latest design approaches, applications, andfuture challenges in the field of neuromorphic engineering.
* Presents examples of practical applications of neuromorphicdesign principles.
Covers address-event communication, retinas, cochleas,locomotion, learning theory, neurons, synapses, floating gatecircuits, hardware and software infrastructure, algorithms, andfuture challenges.
Shih-Chii Liu is a group leader at the Institute ofNeuroinformatics, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich. Shereceived her Ph.D. in the Computation and Neural Systems program atCaltech. She has been an instructor and topic organizer at the NSFTelluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop in Telluride,Colorado since 1998. She has also co-authored a book on analog VLSIcircuits (published by MIT Press), is an IEEE Senior member and hasheld offices in a number of scientific and IEEE engineeringinternational conferences. Dr Liu has been working on event-basedvision and auditory sensors, multi-neuron networks, andasynchronous circuits for more than 20 years.
Tobi Delbruck has been Professor of Physics andElectrical Engineering at the Institute of Neuroinformatics since1998. He leads the Sensors group which focuses on neuromorphicsensors and processing. He received his Ph.D. in the Computationand Neural Systems program at Caltech. He worked onelectronic imaging at Arithmos, Synaptics, National Semiconductor,and Foveon. He co-organized the Telluride Neuromorphic CognitionEngineering summer workshop and the live demonstration sessions atISCAS and NIPS, and is former chair of the IEEE CAS Sensory SystemsTechnical Committee. He has been awarded 9 IEEE awards and is anIEEE Fellow.
Giacomo Indiveri is a Professor at the University ofZurich's Faculty of Science. He obtained his M.Sc. degree inElectrical Engineering and his Ph.D. degree in Computer Sciencefrom the University of Genoa, Italy. He is an ERC fellow and anIEEE Senior member. His research interests lie in the study of realand artificial neural processing systems, and in the hardwareimplementation of neuromorphic cognitive systems, using full customanalog and digital VLSI technology.
Adrian M. Whatley gained a degree in Chemistry at theUniversity of Bristol in England in 1986. After working for 10years in the British computer industry, he took up his currentsoftware engineering position at the Institute of Neuroinformaticswhere he works primarily on asynchronous Address-Eventcommunication systems.
Rodney Douglas is a co-founder of the Institute ofNeuroinformatics. His central research interest over the past 25years has been the nature of computation by the circuits of theneocortex and their implementation both in software simulation, incustom electronic hardware. The experimental aspect of his work hasinspired a number of cortical models of processing that userecurrently connected neuronal architectures. He is currentlyexploring principles of self-assembly in simple organisms andcircuits which he considers crucial for building truly autonomousneuromorphic cognitive systems.
