A biomimetic nanoelectronic neuron with enhanced spike timing

We present an electronic cortical neuron incorporating both active and passive dendritic properties. The circuit is simulated using a carbon nanotube field-effect transistor SPICE model. We demonstrate that our neuron can detect coincident spatiotemporal input, and transform this neural information into a precisely-timed output spike. We also demonstrate that a dendritic spike is key to enhance precisely-timed input-output transformation within an individual neuron; without a dendritic spike it would require more neurons to achieve the same level of precision. Our simulation results show reliable firing and improved precision of output spike when a dendritic spike is initiated.