Paper detail

OTA based 200 GΩ resistance on 700 μm2 in 180 nm CMOS for neuromorphic applications

Generating an exponential decay function with a time constant on the order of hundreds of milliseconds is a mainstay for neuromorphic circuits. Usually, either subthreshold circuits or RC-decays based on transconductance amplifiers are used. In the latter case, transconductances in the 10 pS range are needed. However, state-of-the-art low-transconductance amplifiers still require too much circuit area to be applicable in neuromorphic circuits where >100 of these time constant circuits may be required on a single chip. We present a silicon verified operational transconductance amplifier that achieves a gm of 5 pS in only 700 μm2, a factor of 10-100 less area than current examples. This allows a high-density integration of time constant circuits in target appliations such as synaptic learning or as driving circuit for neuromorphic memristor arrays.