Building the Hardware of Future Artificial Intelligence Systems: 2D Materials Based Electronic Synapses

Yale Electrical Engineering Seminar

"Building the Hardware of Future Artificial Intelligence Systems: 2D Materials Based Electronic Synapses"

Mario Lanza
Institute of Functional Nano & Soft Materials, Soochow University
Collaborative Innovation Center of Suzhou Nano Science & Technology

Abstract: Current AI systems rely on advanced computers to process a massive amount of data and carry out complex operations very fast (<1 ns/operation), and by using sophisticated algorithms. Therefore, until now, progress in AI has been strictly linked to: i) the computing power of the systems used, and ii) the efficiency of the algorithms used to process the data. In order to create more powerful and efficient AI systems, electronic engineers have started to consider the possibility of designing new hardware, i.e. fabricate new electronic circuits that act as artificial neural networks, and that can compute the data as the human brain does. Several different electronic components have been suggested as the hardware implementation of electronic synapses for artificial neural networks, and among them memristors based on metal/insulator/metal (MIM) nanocells are the ones that have shown the best performance. In this talk I will present our work on MIM-like memristors that can be used as electronic synapses. By introducing h-BN in the structure of the memristors we have been able to emulate both volatile or non-volatile RS depending on the amplitude, duration and interval of the electrical impulses applied. This allows emulating several synaptic behaviors, being the ultra low variability of the relaxation process the most remarkable performance. The power consumption in standby and per transition in volatile regime can be as low as 0.1 fW and 600 pW (respectively), and the switching time is <10 ns. These behaviors are related to a novel resistive switching mechanism in the h-BN stack, which is based on the generation of B-vacancies that can be filled by metallic ions from the adjacent electrodes.

Bio: Mario Lanza is a Young 1000 Talent Full Professor (Tenured) at the Institute of Functional Nano & Soft Materials of Soochow University, the fastest growing university in the world in 2015-2016 according to Nature Index. Dr. Lanza got his PhD in Electronics in 2010 at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. During the PhD he was a visiting scholar at The University of Manchester (UK) and Infineon Technologies (Germany). In 2010-2011 he did a postdoc at Peking University, and in 2012-2013 he was a Marie Curie fellow at Stanford University. Dr. Lanza has published over 80 research papers, including Science, Nature Electronics and Advanced Materials, edited an entire book for Wiley-VCH and registered four patents (one of them received 1M$ investment). He is member of the advisory board of Advanced Electronic Materials (Wiley-VCH), Scientific Reports (Nature), Nanotechnology (American Institute of Physics), and Crystal Research and Technology (Wiley-VCH), as well as member of the technical committee of several international conferences. Dr. Lanza is the winner of the 2017 Microelectronic Engineering Young Investigator Award given by Elsevier. His research interests focus on the improvement of electronic devices using 2D materials, with special emphasis on 2D (layered) dielectrics and logic memory devices.

Host: Professor Mark Reed

Tuesday- September 18, 2018
Mason Lab Room 107
9 Hillhouse Ave
4:00 pm