Abstract
With exactly 302 neurons and about 8000 connections, the hermaphrodite of the soil-dwelling ringworm Caenorhabditis elegans features one of the simplest nervous systems in nature. The Si elegans project will provide a reverse-engineerable model of this nematode by emulating its nervous system and embodying it in a virtual world. The hardware will consist of 302 individual FPGAs, each carrying a neuron-specific neural response model. The FPGA neurons will be interconnected by an electro-optical connectome to distribute the signal at the axonal output or gap-junction pin of an FPGA neuron onto the respective synaptic input or gap-junction pins of postsynaptic FPGA neurons. This technology will replicate the known connectome of the nematode to allow for a biomimetic parallel information flow between neurons. This chapter focuses on the comparison of different electro-optical connectome concepts and on the required implementation steps with their advantages and disadvantages being explained.
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Acknowledgments
The Si elegans project 601215 is funded by the 7th Framework Programme (FP7) of the European Union under FET Proactive, call ICT-2011.9.11: Neuro-Bio-Inspired Systems (NBIS). We would like to thank David Evans and Duncan Turner from EBV as well as Noel Nevin, Rahiv Bhateja, Anisha Nanda and Stef Niewiadomski from Altera for fruitful discussions and sponsorship.
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Ferrara, L. et al. (2016). Comparison of Electro-Optical Strategies for Mimicking C. elegans Network Interconnectivity in Hardware. In: Londral, A., Encarnação, P. (eds) Advances in Neurotechnology, Electronics and Informatics. Biosystems & Biorobotics, vol 12. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26242-0_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26242-0_6
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