Stanford team builds artificial synapse

(Credit: Manel Torralba via flickr)

When we learn, electric signals are sent around the brain via synapses, creating neural pathways. Less energy is required each time a path is travelled, as the route becomes more defined. This essentially makes learning and memory part of the same process. Reported in the journal Nature Materials, the Stanford device attempts to mimic this behaviour, co-locating processing and memory, and using much less energy than traditional computing while doing so.

The artificial synapse consists of two thin, flexible films with three terminals, connected by a salt-water electrolyte. The device works as a transistor, with one of the terminals controlling the flow of electricity between the other two. By discharging and recharging it repeatedly, the researchers were able to ‘train’ the synapse, and were able to predict within one per cent of uncertainty what voltage was required to get the synapse to a specific electrical state and keep it there.