CogniGron Seminar: Tony Kenyon & Adnan Mehonic (University College London) - "Materials Challenges for Neuromorphic Electronics" & "Deep learning with memristive devices"

Materials Challenges for Neuromorphic Electronics - Tony Kenyon
Memristive devices offer exciting opportunities to create brain-inspired, neuromorphic, electronics. While there has been considerable research into different types of memristive devices - from those based on phase change materials, ferroelectric effects, magnetic effects to the oxide-based ReRAM systems we work on - challenges remain around variability, endurance, performance, and integration with CMOS electronics. In this talk I will discuss how these challenges can be addressed through careful materials design, highlighting our work on silicon oxide devices.

Deep learning with memristive devices - Adnan Mehonic
The computing power demands to run artificial neural networks (ANNs) are increasing at rates much greater than improvements made with current CMOS-based technologies. The demand has contributed to a need for novel paradigms, including memristor-based accelerators. In the talk, I will present the need and the rationale behind using memristive crossbar arrays as analogue hardware accelerators. I will discuss the main challenges related to device non-idealities and explore two algorithmic approaches to mitigate non-idealities inherent in most memristor-based systems. The first is to apply a concept of committee machines during inference, and the second is nonideality-aware training of memristor-based ANNs.

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More about Tony Kenyon and Adnan Mehonic

Tony Kenyon
Tony Kenyon is a Professor of nanoelectronic & Nanophotonic Materials, and Vice Dean (Research), heading the Nanoelectronic & Nanophotonic Materials group. His group’s work focuses on the application of nanostructured materials to nanoelectronics and photonics. He is particularly interested in resistance switching devices (memristors) based on oxides (mainly silicon oxides, but other CMOS-compatible oxides as well), and how they can be used in novel non-volatile memories, hardware acceleration for Machine Learning, and neuromorphic devices and systems. Kenyon his work on resistance switching earned him a nomination for a personal World Technology Network Award , a “one to watch” UCL business award , and he has set up a company to commercialise this technology – Intrinsic Semiconductor Technologies (www.intrinsicst.com)/).

In the past 12 years his group has pioneered memristance in silicon oxide, achieving several world firsts, including: conclusive demonstration of oxygen emission from electrically-stressed silicon oxide; the first 3D tomograph of oxygen vacancy conductive filaments; demonstrating neural behaviour in memristors; demonstrating Spike Timing Dependent Plasticity in unipolar memristors; optical triggering of memristors by carrier injection.

Adnan Mehonic
Dr Adnan Mehonic, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Nanoelectronics at UCL and Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellow. He demonstrated the first ambient operating all-SiOx memristor. He has been working as a Research Associate in the group of Electronic Materials and Devices, EEE UCL till 2017, developing silicon oxide memristive technology. In 2017, he was awarded a highly prestigious 5-year Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellowship to work on neuromorphic technology for energy-efficient AI hardware. In 2019, he was appointed as a Lecturer in Nanoelectronics. He serves on the advisory boards of Wiley’s Adv. Intelligent Systems, and is an Editor for Front. in Materials and a special issue for Front. in Nanotechnology. He is a board member for IoP’s Dielectrics and Electrostatics group, and an IoP and IET member. At the EEE department, he is the director of the MSc in Nanotechnology.

To date, he has authored more than 40 journal publications and over 60 international conference proceedings (including more than ten invited talks). His research resulted in two major EPSRC project grants - EP/K01739X/1 in 2013 and EP/P013503/1 in 2016, and a Leverhulme grant in 2016. He is the inventor of more than 10 resistance-switching patents and co-founder of spinout company (“IntrinSic Semiconductor Technology”), where he serves as a Chief Technology Officer. He received the “One to Watch 2015” award from UCL Enterprise for UCL’s most innovative staff. He has been named to MIT Technology Review’s annual list of Innovators under 35 in 2021.