Program Manager: Todd Hylton, Ph.D.
 The vision for the Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics (SyNAPSE) program is to develop electronic neuromorphic machine technology that scales to biological levels.
Today's programmable machines are limited not only by their computational capacity, but also by an architecture requiring human-derived algorithms to both describe and process information from their environment. In contrast, biological neural systems (e.g., brains) autonomously process information in complex environments by automatically learning relevant and probabilistically stable features and associations. Since real world problems generally have many variables and nearly infinite combinatorial complexity, neuromorphic electronic machines would be preferable in a host of applications. However, useful and practical implementations do not yet exist.
The SyNAPSE program supports an unprecedented multidisciplinary approach coordinating aggressive technology development activities in the following areas: (1) hardware, (2) architecture, (3) simulation, and (4) environment.
The initial phase of the SyNAPSE program developed nanometer scale electronic synaptic components capable of adapting the connection strength between two neurons in a manner analogous to that seen in biological systems, and simulated the utility of these synaptic components in core microcircuits that support the overall system architecture.
Continuing efforts will focus on hardware development through the stages of microcircuit development, fabrication process development, single chip system development, and multi-chip system development. In support of these hardware developments, the program seeks to develop increasingly capable architecture and design tools, very large-scale computer simulations of the neuromorphic electronic systems to inform the designers and validate the hardware prior to fabrication, and virtual environments for training and testing the simulated and hardware neuromorphic systems.
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