Versatile emulation of spiking neural networks on an accelerated neuromorphic substrate

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the BrainScaleS-2 neuromorphic system's ability to emulate spiking neural networks rapidly and flexibly, enabling complex experiments and fast iteration through its high acceleration and versatile architecture.

Contribution

It introduces the BrainScaleS-2 neuromorphic architecture with embedded microprocessors, showcasing its experimental versatility and high-speed emulation capabilities.

Findings

Achieved 1000x acceleration over biological neural dynamics.

Successfully conducted five distinct experiments demonstrating system flexibility.

Enabled rapid execution of long-duration and multiple trials.

Abstract

We present first experimental results on the novel BrainScaleS-2 neuromorphic architecture based on an analog neuro-synaptic core and augmented by embedded microprocessors for complex plasticity and experiment control. The high acceleration factor of 1000 compared to biological dynamics enables the execution of computationally expensive tasks, by allowing the fast emulation of long-duration experiments or rapid iteration over many consecutive trials. The flexibility of our architecture is demonstrated in a suite of five distinct experiments, which emphasize different aspects of the BrainScaleS-2 system.