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Making bread: Biomimetic strategies for artificial intelligence now and in the future

Frontiers in Neuroscience

Krichmar, Jeffrey L.; Severa, William M.; Khan, Muhammad S.; Olds, James L.

The Artificial Intelligence (AI) revolution foretold of during the 1960s is well underway in the second decade of the twenty first century. Its period of phenomenal growth likely lies ahead. AI-operated machines and technologies will extend the reach of Homo sapiens far beyond the biological constraints imposed by evolution: outwards further into deep space, as well as inwards into the nano-world of DNA sequences and relevant medical applications. And yet, we believe, there are crucial lessons that biology can offer that will enable a prosperous future for AI. For machines in general, and for AI's especially, operating over extended periods or in extreme environments will require energy usage orders of magnitudes more efficient than exists today. In many operational environments, energy sources will be constrained. The AI's design and function may be dependent upon the type of energy source, as well as its availability and accessibility. Any plans for AI devices operating in a challenging environment must begin with the question of how they are powered, where fuel is located, how energy is stored and made available to the machine, and how long the machine can operate on specific energy units. While one of the key advantages of AI use is to reduce the dimensionality of a complex problem, the fact remains that some energy is required for functionality. Hence, the materials and technologies that provide the needed energy represent a critical challenge toward future use scenarios of AI and should be integrated into their design. Here we look to the brain and other aspects of biology as inspiration for Biomimetic Research for Energy-efficient AI Designs (BREAD).

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TYPE Journal Article YEAR 2019
ScopusOSTIDOI

Spiking Neural Algorithms for Markov Process Random Walk

Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Neural Networks

Severa, William M.; Lehoucq, Richard B.; Parekh, Ojas D.; Aimone, James B.

The random walk is a fundamental stochastic process that underlies many numerical tasks in scientific computing applications. We consider here two neural algorithms that can be used to efficiently implement random walks on spiking neuromorphic hardware. The first method tracks the positions of individual walkers independently by using a modular code inspired by the grid cell spatial representation in the brain. The second method tracks the densities of random walkers at each spatial location directly. We analyze the scaling complexity of each of these methods and illustrate their ability to model random walkers under different probabilistic conditions.

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TYPE Conference Poster YEAR 2018
ScopusOSTIDOI

Neural Networks as Surrogates of Nonlinear High-Dimensional Parameter-to-Prediction Maps

Jakeman, John D.; Perego, Mauro P.; Severa, William M.

We present a preliminary investigation of the use of Multi-Layer Perceptrons (MLP) and Recurrent Neural Networks (RNNs) as surrogates of parameter-to-prediction maps of com- putational expensive dynamical models. In particular, we target the approximation of Quan- tities of Interest (QoIs) derived from the solution of a Partial Differential Equations (PDEs) at different time instants. In order to limit the scope of our study while targeting a rele- vant application, we focus on the problem of computing variations in the ice sheets mass (our QoI), which is a proxy for global mean sea-level changes. We present a number of neural network formulations and compare their performance with that of Polynomial Chaos Expansions (PCE) constructed on the same data.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2018
OSTIDOI

Neural Algorithms for Low Power Implementation of Partial Differential Equations

Aimone, James B.; Hill, Aaron J.; Lehoucq, Richard B.; Parekh, Ojas D.; Reeder, Leah E.; Severa, William M.

The rise of low-power neuromorphic hardware has the potential to change high-performance computing; however much of the focus on brain-inspired hardware has been on machine learning applications. A low-power solution for solving partial differential equations could radically change how we approach large-scale computing in the future. The random walk is a fundamental stochastic process that underlies many numerical tasks in scientific computing applications. We consider here two neural algorithms that can be used to efficiently implement random walks on spiking neuromorphic hardware. The first method tracks the positions of individual walkers independently by using a modular code inspired by grid cells in the brain. The second method tracks the densities of random walkers at each spatial location directly. We present the scaling complexity of each of these methods and illustrate their ability to model random walkers under different probabilistic conditions. Finally, we present implementations of these algorithms on neuromorphic hardware.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2018
OSTIDOI

A spike-Timing neuromorphic architecture

2017 IEEE International Conference on Rebooting Computing, ICRC 2017 - Proceedings

Hill, Aaron J.; Donaldson, Jonathon W.; Rothganger, Fredrick R.; Vineyard, Craig M.; Follett, David R.; Follett, Pamela L.; Smith, Michael R.; Verzi, Stephen J.; Severa, William M.; Wang, Felix W.; Aimone, James B.; Naegle, John H.; James, Conrad D.

Unlike general purpose computer architectures that are comprised of complex processor cores and sequential computation, the brain is innately parallel and contains highly complex connections between computational units (neurons). Key to the architecture of the brain is a functionality enabled by the combined effect of spiking communication and sparse connectivity with unique variable efficacies and temporal latencies. Utilizing these neuroscience principles, we have developed the Spiking Temporal Processing Unit (STPU) architecture which is well-suited for areas such as pattern recognition and natural language processing. In this paper, we formally describe the STPU, implement the STPU on a field programmable gate array, and show measured performance data.

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TYPE Conference Poster YEAR 2017
ScopusOSTIDOI

Neural computing for scientific computing applications

ACM International Conference Proceeding Series

Aimone, James B.; Parekh, Ojas D.; Severa, William M.

Neural computing has been identified as a computing alternative in the post-Moore's Law era, however much of its attention has been directed at specialized applications such as machine learning. For scientific computing applications, particularly those that often depend on supercomputing, it is not clear that neural machine learning is the exclusive contribution to be made by neuromorphic platforms. In our presentation, we will discuss ways that looking to the brain as a whole and neurons specifically can provide new sources for inspiration for computing beyond current machine learning applications. Particularly for scientific computing, where approximate methods for computation introduce additional challenges, the development of non-approximate methods for neural computation is potentially quite valuable. In addition, the brain's dramatic ability to utilize context at many different scales and incorporate information from many different modalities is a capability currently poorly realized by neural machine learning approaches yet offers considerable potential impact on scientific applications.

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TYPE Conference Poster YEAR 2017
ScopusOSTIDOI
Results 51–75 of 90
Results 51–75 of 90