{"id":6106,"date":"2014-08-08T00:18:00","date_gmt":"2014-08-08T00:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/198.74.50.173\/2014\/08\/ibm-announces-1-million-neuron.html"},"modified":"2017-04-07T03:51:56","modified_gmt":"2017-04-07T03:51:56","slug":"ibm-announces-1-million-neuron","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextbigfuture.com\/2014\/08\/ibm-announces-1-million-neuron.html","title":{"rendered":"IBM announces 1 million neuron cognitive chip"},"content":{"rendered":"

The latest IBM SyNAPSE chip, introduced on August 7, 2014, has the potential to transform mobility <\/a> by spurring innovation around an entirely new class of applications with sensory capabilities at incredibly low power levels. This is enabled by an revolutionary new technology design inspired by the human brain. IBM built a new chip with a brain-inspired computer architecture powered by an unprecedented 1 million neurons and 256 million synapses. It is the largest chip IBM has ever built at 5.4 billion transistors, and has an on-chip network of 4,096 neurosynaptic cores. Yet, it only consumes 70mW during real-time operation \u2014 orders of magnitude less energy than traditional chips. As part of a complete cognitive hardware and software ecosystem, this technology opens new computing frontiers for distributed sensor and supercomputing applications.<\/p>\n

IBM’s brain-inspired architecture consists of a network of neurosynaptic cores. Cores are distributed and operated in parallel. Core operate -without a clock- in an event-driven fashion. Cores integrate memory, computation, and communication. Individual cores can fail and yet, like the brain, the architecture can still function. Cores on the same chip communicate with one another via an on-chip event-driven network. Chips communicate via an inter-chip interface leading to seamless scalability like the cortex, enabling creation of scalable neuromorphic systems.<\/p>\n

TrueNorth neuromorphic chips are pretty much ready to go for commercial applications. On the data center\/supercomputer side of things, IBM already has dozens of big data solutions \u2014 such as Watson \u2014 that could be dramatically enhanced by TrueNorth. For consumers, the fact that TrueNorth consumes much less power than conventional Von Neumann chips could be significant. While TrueNorth isn\u2019t going to run your operating system any time soon, it would make a fantastically efficient coprocessor to handle sensor input, computer vision, AI (self-driving cars), and other emerging spheres in personal\/wearable computing.”<\/p>\n

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Today\u2019s breakthrough, published in Science in collaboration with Cornell Tech, is a significant step towards bringing cognitive computers to society.<\/p>\n

There is a huge disparity between the human brain\u2019s cognitive capability and ultra-low power consumption when compared to today\u2019s computers. To bridge the divide, IBM scientists created something that didn\u2019t previously exist\u2014an entirely new neuroscience-inspired scalable and efficient computer architecture that breaks path with the prevailing von Neumann architecture used almost universally since 1946.<\/p>\n

This second generation chip is the culmination of almost a decade of research and development, including the initial single core hardware prototype in 2011 and software ecosystem with a new programming language and chip simulator in 2013.<\/p>\n

The new cognitive chip architecture has an on-chip two-dimensional mesh network of 4096 digital, distributed neurosynaptic cores, where each core module integrates memory, computation, and communication, and operates in an event-driven, parallel, and fault-tolerant fashion. To enable system scaling beyond single-chip boundaries, adjacent chips, when tiled, can seamlessly connect to each other\u2014building a foundation for future neurosynaptic supercomputers. To demonstrate scalability, IBM also revealed a 16-chip system with sixteen million programmable neurons and four billion programmable synapses.<\/p>\n

\u201cIBM has broken new ground in the field of brain-inspired computers, in terms of a radically new architecture, unprecedented scale, unparalleled power\/area\/speed efficiency, boundless scalability, and innovative design techniques. We foresee new generations of information technology systems \u2013 that complement today\u2019s von Neumann machines \u2013 powered by an evolving ecosystem of systems, software, and services,\u201d said Dr. Dharmendra S. Modha, IBM Fellow and IBM Chief Scientist, Brain-Inspired Computing, IBM Research. \u201cThese brain-inspired chips could transform mobility, via sensory and intelligent applications that can fit in the palm of your hand but without the need for Wi-Fi. This achievement underscores IBM\u2019s leadership role at pivotal transformational moments in the history of computing via long-term investment in organic innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has funded the project since 2008 with approximately $53M via Phase 0, Phase 1, Phase 2, and Phase 3 of the Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics (SyNAPSE) program. Current collaborators include Cornell Tech and iniLabs, Ltd.<\/p>\n

Building the Chip<\/b><\/p>\n

The chip was fabricated using Samsung\u2019s 28nm process technology that has a dense on-chip memory and low-leakage transistors.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is an astonishing achievement to leverage a process traditionally used for commercially available, low-power mobile devices to deliver a chip that emulates the human brain by processing extreme amounts of sensory information with very little power,\u201d said Shawn Han, vice president of Foundry Marketing, Samsung Electronics. \u201cThis is a huge architectural breakthrough that is essential as the industry moves toward the next-generation cloud and big-data processing. It\u2019s a pleasure to be part of technical progress for next-generation through Samsung\u2019s 28nm technology.\u201d<\/p>\n

The event-driven circuit elements of the chip used the asynchronous design methodology developed at Cornell Tech and refined with IBM since 2008.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter years of collaboration with IBM, we are now a step closer to building a computer similar to our brain,\u201d said Professor Rajit Manohar, Cornell Tech.<\/p>\n

The combination of cutting-edge process technology, hybrid asynchronous-synchronous design methodology, and new architecture has led to a power density of 20mW\/cm2 which is nearly four orders of magnitude less than today\u2019s microprocessors.<\/p>\n

Advancing the SyNAPSE Ecosystem<\/b><\/p>\n

The new chip is a component of a complete end-to-end vertically integrated ecosystem spanning a chip simulator, neuroscience data, supercomputing, neuron specification, programming paradigm, algorithms and applications, and prototype design models. The ecosystem supports all aspects of the programming cycle from design through development, debugging, and deployment.<\/p>\n

To bring forth this fundamentally different technological capability to society, IBM has designed a novel teaching curriculum for universities, customers, partners, and IBM employees.<\/p>\n

Applications and Vision<\/b><\/p>\n

This ecosystem signals a shift in moving computation closer to the data, taking in vastly varied kinds of sensory data, analyzing and integrating real-time information in a context-dependent way, and dealing with the ambiguity found in complex, real-world environments.<\/p>\n

Looking to the future, IBM is working on integrating multi-sensory neurosynaptic processing into mobile devices constrained by power, volume and speed; integrating novel event-driven sensors with the chip; real-time multimedia cloud services accelerated by neurosynaptic systems; and neurosynaptic supercomputers by tiling multiple chips on a board, creating systems that would eventually scale to one hundred trillion synapses and beyond.<\/p>

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Building on previously demonstrated neurosynaptic cores with on-chip, online learning, IBM envisions building learning systems that adapt in real world settings. While today\u2019s hardware is fabricated using a modern CMOS process, the underlying architecture is poised to exploit advances in future memory, 3D integration, logic, and sensor technologies to deliver even lower power, denser package, and faster speed.<\/p>\n

If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on ycombinator<\/a><\/b> or StumbleUpon<\/a><\/b>. Thanks<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The latest IBM SyNAPSE chip, introduced on August 7, 2014, has the potential to transform mobility by spurring innovation around an entirely new class of applications with sensory capabilities at incredibly low power levels. This is enabled by an revolutionary new technology design inspired by the human brain. IBM built a new chip with a … <\/p>\n

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