Neuromorphic Chips

W.Carryl Joseph
Microprocessors configured more like brains than traditional
chips could soon make computers far more astute about
whats going on around them
Why It Matters
Traditional chips are reaching fundamental performance limits.
Todays computers all use the so-called von Neumann architecture, which shuttles
data back and forth between a central processor and memory chips in linear
sequences of calculations. That method is great for crunching numbers and
executing precisely written programs, but not for processing images or sound and
making sense of it all.
Continuing to improve the performance of such processors requires their
manufacturers to pack in ever more, ever faster transistors, silicon memory caches,
and data pathways, but the sheer heat generated by all those components is
limiting how fast chips can be operated, especially in power-stingy mobile devices.
That could halt progress toward devices that effectively process images, sound, and
other sensory information and then apply it to tasks such as face recognition and
robot or vehicle navigation.
Neuromorphic chips attempt to model in silicon the massively parallel way the brain
processes information as billions of neurons and trillions of synapses respond to
sensory inputs such as visual and auditory stimuli. Those neurons also change how
they connect with each other in response to changing images, sounds, and the like.
That is the process we call learning. The chips, which incorporate brain-inspired
models called neural networks, do the same.
The idea of neuromorphic chips dates back decades. Carver Mead, the Caltech
professor emeritus who is a legend in integrated-circuit design, coined the term in a
1990 paper, describing how analog chipsthose that vary in their output, like real-
world phenomena, in contrast to the binary, on-or-off nature of digital chipscould
mimic the electrical activity of neurons and synapses in the brain.
Only one arguably neuromorphic processor, a noise suppression chip made by
Audience, has sold in the hundreds of millions. The chip, which is based on the
human cochlea, has been used in phones from Apple, Samsung, and other
Reference:Neuromorphic chips by Robert D. Hof