5 research outputs found
The design of a neural network compiler
Computer simulation is a flexible and economical way for
rapid prototyping and concept evaluation with Neural
Network (NN) models. Increasing research on NNs has led
to the development of several simulation programs. Not
all simulations have the same scope. Some simulations
allow only a fixed network model and some are more
general. Designing a simulation program for general
purpose NN models has become a current trend nowadays
because of its flexibility and efficiency. A proper
programming language specifically for NN models is
preferred since the existing high-level languages such as
C are for NN designers from a strong computer background.
The program translations for NN languages come from
combinations which are either interpreter and/or
compiler. There are also various styles of programming
languages such as a procedural, functional, descriptive
and object-oriented.
The main focus of this thesis is to study the
feasibility of using a compiler method for the
development of a general-purpose simulator - NEUCOMP that
compiles the program written as a list of mathematical
specifications of the particular NN model and translates
it into a chosen target program. The language supported
by NEUCOMP is based on a procedural style. Information
regarding the list of mathematical statements required by
the NN models are written in the program. The
mathematical statements used are represented by scalar,
vector and matrix assignments. NEUCOMP translates these
expressions into actual program loops.
NEUCOMP enables compilation of a simulation program
written in the NEUCOMP language for any NN model,
contains graphical facilities such as portraying the NN
architecture and displaying a graph of the result during
training and finally to have a program that can run on a
parallel shared memory multi-processor system
Emotion, motivation, decision-making, the orbitofrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, and the amygdala
The orbitofrontal cortex and amygdala are involved in emotion and in motivation, but the relationship between these functions performed by these brain structures is not clear. To address this, a unified theory of emotion and motivation is described in which motivational states are states in which instrumental goal-directed actions are performed to obtain rewards or avoid punishers, and emotional states are states that are elicited when the reward or punisher is or is not received. This greatly simplifies our understanding of emotion and motivation, for the same set of genes and associated brain systems can define the primary or unlearned rewards and punishers such as sweet taste or pain. Recent evidence on the connectivity of human brain systems involved in emotion and motivation indicates that the orbitofrontal cortex is involved in reward value and experienced emotion with outputs to cortical regions including those involved in language, and is a key brain region involved in depression and the associated changes in motivation. The amygdala has weak effective connectivity back to the cortex in humans, and is implicated in brainstem-mediated responses to stimuli such as freezing and autonomic activity, rather than in declarative emotion. The anterior cingulate cortex is involved in learning actions to obtain rewards, and with the orbitofrontal cortex and ventromedial prefrontal cortex in providing the goals for navigation and in reward-related effects on memory consolidation mediated partly via the cholinergic system
SpiNNaker - A Spiking Neural Network Architecture
20 years in conception and 15 in construction, the SpiNNaker project has delivered the world’s largest neuromorphic computing platform incorporating over a million ARM mobile phone processors and capable of modelling spiking neural networks of the scale of a mouse brain in biological real time. This machine, hosted at the University of Manchester in the UK, is freely available under the auspices of the EU Flagship Human Brain Project. This book tells the story of the origins of the machine, its development and its deployment, and the immense software development effort that has gone into making it openly available and accessible to researchers and students the world over. It also presents exemplar applications from ‘Talk’, a SpiNNaker-controlled robotic exhibit at the Manchester Art Gallery as part of ‘The Imitation Game’, a set of works commissioned in 2016 in honour of Alan Turing, through to a way to solve hard computing problems using stochastic neural networks. The book concludes with a look to the future, and the SpiNNaker-2 machine which is yet to come
SpiNNaker - A Spiking Neural Network Architecture
20 years in conception and 15 in construction, the SpiNNaker project has delivered the world’s largest neuromorphic computing platform incorporating over a million ARM mobile phone processors and capable of modelling spiking neural networks of the scale of a mouse brain in biological real time. This machine, hosted at the University of Manchester in the UK, is freely available under the auspices of the EU Flagship Human Brain Project. This book tells the story of the origins of the machine, its development and its deployment, and the immense software development effort that has gone into making it openly available and accessible to researchers and students the world over. It also presents exemplar applications from ‘Talk’, a SpiNNaker-controlled robotic exhibit at the Manchester Art Gallery as part of ‘The Imitation Game’, a set of works commissioned in 2016 in honour of Alan Turing, through to a way to solve hard computing problems using stochastic neural networks. The book concludes with a look to the future, and the SpiNNaker-2 machine which is yet to come