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A scalable neuristor built with Mott memristors

Nature Materials volume 12, pages 114–117 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

The Hodgkin–Huxley model for action potential generation in biological axons1 is central for understanding the computational capability of the nervous system and emulating its functionality. Owing to the historical success of silicon complementary metal-oxide-semiconductors, spike-based computing is primarily confined to software simulations2,3,4 and specialized analogue metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor circuits5,6,7,8. However, there is interest in constructing physical systems that emulate biological functionality more directly, with the goal of improving efficiency and scale. The neuristor9 was proposed as an electronic device with properties similar to the Hodgkin–Huxley axon, but previous implementations were not scalable10,11,12,13. Here we demonstrate a neuristor built using two nanoscale Mott memristors, dynamical devices that exhibit transient memory and negative differential resistance arising from an insulating-to-conducting phase transition driven by Joule heating. This neuristor exhibits the important neural functions of all-or-nothing spiking with signal gain and diverse periodic spiking, using materials and structures that are amenable to extremely high-density integration with or without silicon transistors.

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Figure 1: Neuristor diagram and Mott memristor device characteristics.
Figure 2: All-or-nothing response and state variable dynamics of the neuristor.
Figure 3: Experimental and simulated spike trains.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge J. Borghetti for seeding important discussions on biological oscillators with the authors; X. Li, C. Le and T. Ha for fabrication and laboratory support; and J. P. Strachan for review and discussion of the manuscript.

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  1. HP Labs, Palo Alto, California 94304, USA

    Matthew D. Pickett, Gilberto Medeiros-Ribeiro & R. Stanley Williams

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  1. Matthew D. Pickett
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  2. Gilberto Medeiros-Ribeiro
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  3. R. Stanley Williams
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Contributions

M.D.P. conceived, simulated, fabricated and tested the neuristor described in this work. R.S.W. guided the work and provided critical insight. G.M-R. provided discussion and analysis of results and essential management support. M.D.P. and R.S.W. wrote the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Matthew D. Pickett.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Pickett, M., Medeiros-Ribeiro, G. & Williams, R. A scalable neuristor built with Mott memristors. Nature Mater 12, 114–117 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3510

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