Searcharxiv⌕ Search

arXiv subjects

Sonia M. Buckley

Publications and source records attributed to Sonia M. Buckley.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

Fully analog end-to-end online training with real-time adaptibility on integrated photonic platform

Analog neuromorphic photonic processors are uniquely positioned to harness the ultrafast bandwidth and inherent parallelism of light, enabling scalability, on-chip integration and significant improvement in computational performance. However, major challenges remain unresolved especially in achieving real-time online training, efficient end-to-end anolog systems, and adaptive learning for dynamical environmental changes. Here, we demonstrate an on-chip photonic analog end-to-end adaptive learning system realized on a foundry-manufactured silicon photonic integrated circuit. Our platform leverages a multiplexed gradient descent algorithm to perform in-situ, on-the-fly training, while maintaining robustness in online tracking and real-time adaptation. At its core, the processor features a monolithic integration of a microring resonator weight bank array and on-chip photodetectors, enabling direct optical measurement of gradient signals. This eliminates the need for high-precision digital matrix multiplications, significantly reducing computational overhead and latency, an essential requirement for effective online training. We experimentally demonstrate real-time, end-to-end analog training for both linear and nonlinear classification tasks at gigabaud rates, achieving accuracies of over 90\% and 80\%, respectively. Our analog neuromorphic processor introduces self-learning capabilities that dynamically adjust training parameters, setting the stage for truly autonomous neuromorphic architectures capable of efficient, real-time processing in unpredictable real-world environments. As a result, we showcase adaptive online tracking of dynamically changing input datasets and achieve over 90\% accuracy, alongside robustness to external temperature fluctuations and internal thermal crosstalk.

physics.optics↗

Scaling of hardware-compatible perturbative training algorithms

In this work, we explore the capabilities of multiplexed gradient descent (MGD), a scalable and efficient perturbative zeroth-order training method for estimating the gradient of a loss function in hardware and training it via stochastic gradient descent. We extend the framework to include both weight and node perturbation, and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each approach. We investigate the time to train networks using MGD as a function of network size and task complexity. Previous research has suggested that perturbative training methods do not scale well to large problems, since in these methods the time to estimate the gradient scales linearly with the number of network parameters. However, in this work we show that the time to reach a target accuracy--that is, actually solve the problem of interest--does not follow this undesirable linear scaling, and in fact often decreases with network size. Furthermore, we demonstrate that MGD can be used to calculate a drop-in replacement for the gradient in stochastic gradient descent, and therefore optimization accelerators such as momentum can be used alongside MGD, ensuring compatibility with existing machine learning practices. Our results indicate that MGD can efficiently train large networks on hardware, achieving accuracy comparable to backpropagation, thus presenting a practical solution for future neuromorphic computing systems.

cs.LG↗

Multiplexed gradient descent: Fast online training of modern datasets on hardware neural networks without backpropagation

We present multiplexed gradient descent (MGD), a gradient descent framework designed to easily train analog or digital neural networks in hardware. MGD utilizes zero-order optimization techniques for online training of hardware neural networks. We demonstrate its ability to train neural networks on modern machine learning datasets, including CIFAR-10 and Fashion-MNIST, and compare its performance to backpropagation. Assuming realistic timescales and hardware parameters, our results indicate that these optimization techniques can train a network on emerging hardware platforms orders of magnitude faster than the wall-clock time of training via backpropagation on a standard GPU, even in the presence of imperfect weight updates or device-to-device variations in the hardware. We additionally describe how it can be applied to existing hardware as part of chip-in-the-loop training, or integrated directly at the hardware level. Crucially, the MGD framework is highly flexible, and its gradient descent process can be optimized to compensate for specific hardware limitations such as slow parameter-update speeds or limited input bandwidth.

cs.LG↗

Demonstration of Superconducting Optoelectronic Single-Photon Synapses

Superconducting optoelectronic hardware is being explored as a path towards artificial spiking neural networks with unprecedented scales of complexity and computational ability. Such hardware combines integrated-photonic components for few-photon, light-speed communication with superconducting circuits for fast, energy-efficient computation. Monolithic integration of superconducting and photonic devices is necessary for the scaling of this technology. In the present work, superconducting-nanowire single-photon detectors are monolithically integrated with Josephson junctions for the first time, enabling the realization of superconducting optoelectronic synapses. We present circuits that perform analog weighting and temporal leaky integration of single-photon presynaptic signals. Synaptic weighting is implemented in the electronic domain so that binary, single-photon communication can be maintained. Records of recent synaptic activity are locally stored as current in superconducting loops. Dendritic and neuronal nonlinearities are implemented with a second stage of Josephson circuitry. The hardware presents great design flexibility, with demonstrated synaptic time constants spanning four orders of magnitude (hundreds of nanoseconds to milliseconds). The synapses are responsive to presynaptic spike rates exceeding 10 MHz and consume approximately 33 aJ of dynamic power per synapse event before accounting for cooling. In addition to neuromorphic hardware, these circuits introduce new avenues towards realizing large-scale single-photon-detector arrays for diverse imaging, sensing, and quantum communication applications.

physics.app-ph↗

Integrated-photonic characterization of single-photon detectors for use in neuromorphic synapses

We show several techniques for using integrated-photonic waveguide structures to simultaneously characterize multiple waveguide-integrated superconducting-nanowire detectors with a single fiber input. The first set of structures allows direct comparison of detector performance of waveguide-integrated detectors with various widths and lengths. The second type of demonstrated integrated-photonic structure allows us to achieve detection with a high dynamic range. This device allows a small number of detectors to count photons across many orders of magnitude in count rate. However, we find a stray light floor of -30 dB limits the dynamic range to three orders of magnitude. To assess the utility of the detectors for use in synapses in spiking neural systems, we measured the response with average incident photon numbers ranging from less than $10^{-3}$ to greater than $10$. The detector response is identical across this entire range, indicating that synaptic responses based on these detectors will be independent of the number of incident photons in a communication pulse. Such a binary response is ideal for communication in neural systems. We further demonstrate that the response has a linear dependence of output current pulse height on bias current with up to a factor of 1.7 tunability in pulse height. Throughout the work, we compare room-temperature measurements to cryogenic measurements. The agreement indicates room-temperature measurements can be used to determine important properties of the detectors.

physics.ins-det↗

Optimization of photoluminescence from W centers in silicon-on-insulator

W centers are trigonal defects generated by self-ion implantation in silicon that exhibit photoluminescence at 1.218 $μ$m. We have shown previously that they can be used in waveguide-integrated all-silicon light-emitting diodes (LEDs). Here we optimize the implant energy, fluence and anneal conditions to maximize the photoluminescence intensity for W centers implanted in silicon-on-insulator, a substrate suitable for waveguide-integrated devices. After optimization, we observe near two orders of magnitude improvement in photoluminescence intensity relative to the conditions with the stopping range of the implanted ions at the center of the silicon device layer. The previously demonstrated waveguide-integrated LED used implant conditions with the stopping range at the center of this layer. We further show that such light sources can be manufactured at the 300-mm scale by demonstrating photoluminescence of similar intensity from 300 mm silicon-on-insulator wafers. The luminescence uniformity across the entire wafer is within the measurement error.

physics.app-ph↗

Superconducting microwire detectors with single-photon sensitivity in the near-infrared

We report on the fabrication and characterization of single-photon-sensitive WSi superconducting detectors with wire widths from 1 μm to 3 μm. The devices achieve saturated internal detection efficiency at 1.55 μm wavelength and exhibit maximum count rates in excess of 10^5 s^-1. We also investigate the material properties of the silicon-rich WSi films used for these devices. We find that many devices with active lengths of several hundred microns exhibit critical currents in excess of 50% of the depairing current. A meandered detector with 2.0 μm wire width is demonstrated over a surface area of 362x362 μm^2, showcasing the material and device quality achieved.

physics.app-ph↗

Low-loss, high-bandwidth fiber-to-chip coupling using capped adiabatic tapered fibers

We demonstrate adiabatically tapered fibers terminating in sub-micron tips that are clad with a higher-index material for coupling to an on-chip waveguide. This cladding enables coupling to a high-index waveguide without losing light to the buried oxide. A technique to clad the tip of the tapered fiber with a higher-index polymer is introduced. Conventional tapered waveguides and forked tapered waveguide structures are investigated for coupling from the clad fiber to the on-chip waveguide. We find the forked waveguide facilitates alignment and packaging, while the conventional taper leads to higher bandwidth. The insertion loss from a fiber through a forked coupler to a sub-micron silicon nitride waveguide is 1.1 dB and the 3 dB-bandwidth is 90 nm. The coupling loss in the packaged device is 1.3 dB. With a fiber coupled to a conventional tapered waveguide, the loss is 1.4 dB with a 3 dB bandwidth extending beyond the range of the measurement apparatus, estimated to exceed 250 nm.

physics.app-ph↗

Circuit designs for superconducting optoelectronic loop neurons

Optical communication achieves high fanout and short delay advantageous for information integration in neural systems. Superconducting detectors enable signaling with single photons for maximal energy efficiency. We present designs of superconducting optoelectronic neurons based on superconducting single-photon detectors, Josephson junctions, semiconductor light sources, and multi-planar dielectric waveguides. These circuits achieve complex synaptic and neuronal functions with high energy efficiency, leveraging the strengths of light for communication and superconducting electronics for computation. The neurons send few-photon signals to synaptic connections. These signals communicate neuronal firing events as well as update synaptic weights. Spike-timing-dependent plasticity is implemented with a single photon triggering each step of the process. Microscale light-emitting diodes and waveguide networks enable connectivity from a neuron to thousands of synaptic connections, and the use of light for communication enables synchronization of neurons across an area limited only by the distance light can travel within the period of a network oscillation. Experimentally, each of the requisite circuit elements has been demonstrated, yet a hardware platform combining them all has not been attempted. Compared to digital logic or quantum computing, device tolerances are relaxed. For this neural application, optical sources providing incoherent pulses with 10,000 photons produced with efficiency of 10$^{-3}$ operating at 20\,MHz at 4.2\,K are sufficient to enable a massively scalable neural computing platform with connectivity comparable to the brain and thirty thousand times higher speed.

cs.NE↗

Superconducting Optoelectronic Neurons III: Synaptic Plasticity

As a means of dynamically reconfiguring the synaptic weight of a superconducting optoelectronic loop neuron, a superconducting flux storage loop is inductively coupled to the synaptic current bias of the neuron. A standard flux memory cell is used to achieve a binary synapse, and loops capable of storing many flux quanta are used to enact multi-stable synapses. Circuits are designed to implement supervised learning wherein current pulses add or remove flux from the loop to strengthen or weaken the synaptic weight. Designs are presented for circuits with hundreds of intermediate synaptic weights between minimum and maximum strengths. Circuits for implementing unsupervised learning are modeled using two photons to strengthen and two photons to weaken the synaptic weight via Hebbian and anti-Hebbian learning rules, and techniques are proposed to control the learning rate. Implementation of short-term plasticity, homeostatic plasticity, and metaplasticity in loop neurons is discussed.

cs.NE↗

Superconducting Optoelectronic Neurons I: General Principles

The design of neural hardware is informed by the prominence of differentiated processing and information integration in cognitive systems. The central role of communication leads to the principal assumption of the hardware platform: signals between neurons should be optical to enable fanout and communication with minimal delay. The requirement of energy efficiency leads to the utilization of superconducting detectors to receive single-photon signals. We discuss the potential of superconducting optoelectronic hardware to achieve the spatial and temporal information integration advantageous for cognitive processing, and we consider physical scaling limits based on light-speed communication. We introduce the superconducting optoelectronic neurons and networks that are the subject of the subsequent papers in this series.

cs.NE↗

Superconducting Optoelectronic Neurons V: Networks and Scaling

Networks of superconducting optoelectronic neurons are investigated for their near-term technological potential and long-term physical limitations. Networks with short average path length, high clustering coefficient, and power-law degree distribution are designed using a growth model that assigns connections between new and existing nodes based on spatial distance as well as degree of existing nodes. The network construction algorithm is scalable to arbitrary levels of network hierarchy and achieves systems with fractal spatial properties and efficient wiring. By modeling the physical size of superconducting optoelectronic neurons, we calculate the area of these networks. A system with 8100 neurons and 330,430 total synapses will fit on a 1\,cm $\times$ 1\,cm die. Systems of millions of neurons with hundreds of millions of synapses will fit on a 300\,mm wafer. For multi-wafer assemblies, communication at light speed enables a neuronal pool the size of a large data center comprising 100 trillion neurons with coherent oscillations at 1\,MHz. Assuming a power law frequency distribution, as is necessary for self-organized criticality, we calculate the power consumption of the networks. We find the use of single photons for communication and superconducting circuits for computation leads to power density low enough to be cooled by liquid $^4$He for networks of any scale.

cs.NE↗

Superconducting Optoelectronic Neurons II: Receiver Circuits

Circuits using superconducting single-photon detectors and Josephson junctions to perform signal reception, synaptic weighting, and integration are investigated. The circuits convert photon-detection events into flux quanta, the number of which is determined by the synaptic weight. The current from many synaptic connections is inductively coupled to a superconducting loop that implements the neuronal threshold operation. Designs are presented for synapses and neurons that perform integration as well as detect coincidence events for temporal coding. Both excitatory and inhibitory connections are demonstrated. It is shown that a neuron with a single integration loop can receive input from 1000 such synaptic connections, and neurons of similar design could employ many loops for dendritic processing.

q-bio.NC↗

Design, fabrication and metrology of 10$\,\times\,$100 multi-planar integrated photonic routing manifolds for neural networks

We design, fabricate and characterize integrated photonic routing manifolds with 10 inputs and 100 outputs using two vertically integrated planes of silicon nitride waveguides. We analyze manifolds via top-view camera imaging. This measurement technique allows the rapid acquisition of hundreds of precise transmission measurements. We demonstrate manifolds with uniform and Gaussian power distribution patterns with mean power output errors (averaged over 10 sets of 10 inputs) of 0.7 and 0.9 dB, respectively, establishing this as a viable architecture for precision light distribution on-chip. We also assess the performance of the passive photonic elements comprising the system via self-referenced test structures, including high-dynamic-range beam taps, waveguide cutback structures, and waveguide crossing arrays.

physics.app-ph↗

Superconducting Optoelectronic Neurons IV: Transmitter Circuits

A superconducting optoelectronic neuron will produce a small current pulse upon reaching threshold. We present an amplifier chain that converts this small current pulse to a voltage pulse sufficient to produce light from a semiconductor diode. This light is the signal used to communicate between neurons in the network. The amplifier chain comprises a thresholding Josephson junction, a relaxation oscillator Josephson junction, a superconducting thin-film current-gated current amplifier, and a superconducting thin-film current-gated voltage amplifier. We analyze the performance of the elements in the amplifier chain in the time domain to calculate the energy consumption per photon created for several values of light-emitting diode capacitance and efficiency. The speed of the amplification sequence allows neuronal firing up to at least 20\,MHz with power density low enough to be cooled easily with standard $^4$He cryogenic systems operating at 4.2\,K.

cs.NE↗

Superconducting optoelectronic circuits for neuromorphic computing

Neural networks have proven effective for solving many difficult computational problems. Implementing complex neural networks in software is very computationally expensive. To explore the limits of information processing, it will be necessary to implement new hardware platforms with large numbers of neurons, each with a large number of connections to other neurons. Here we propose a hybrid semiconductor-superconductor hardware platform for the implementation of neural networks and large-scale neuromorphic computing. The platform combines semiconducting few-photon light-emitting diodes with superconducting-nanowire single-photon detectors to behave as spiking neurons. These processing units are connected via a network of optical waveguides, and variable weights of connection can be implemented using several approaches. The use of light as a signaling mechanism overcomes fanout and parasitic constraints on electrical signals while simultaneously introducing physical degrees of freedom which can be employed for computation. The use of supercurrents achieves the low power density necessary to scale to systems with enormous entropy. The proposed processing units can operate at speeds of at least $20$ MHz with fully asynchronous activity, light-speed-limited latency, and power densities on the order of 1 mW/cm$^2$ for neurons with 700 connections operating at full speed at 2 K. The processing units achieve an energy efficiency of $\approx 20$ aJ per synapse event. By leveraging multilayer photonics with deposited waveguides and superconductors with feature sizes $>$ 100 nm, this approach could scale to systems with massive interconnectivity and complexity for advanced computing as well as explorations of information processing capacity in systems with an enormous number of information-bearing microstates.

cs.NE↗

A versatile, inexpensive integrated photonics platform

We present an approach to fabrication and packaging of integrated photonic devices that utilizes waveguide and detector layers deposited at near-ambient temperature. All lithography is performed with a 365 nm i-line stepper, facilitating low cost and high scalability. We have shown low-loss SiN waveguides, high-$Q$ ring resonators, critically coupled ring resonators, 50/50 beam splitters, Mach-Zehnder interferometers (MZIs) and a process-agnostic fiber packaging scheme. We have further explored the utility of this process for applications in nonlinear optics and quantum photonics. We demonstrate spectral tailoring and octave-spanning supercontinuum generation as well as the integration of superconducting nanowire single photon detectors with MZIs and channel-dropping filters. The packaging approach is suitable for operation up to 160 \degree C as well as below 1 K. The process is well suited for augmentation of existing foundry capabilities or as a stand-alone process.

physics.optics↗