Complete Neuron-Astrocyte Interaction Model: Digital Multiplierless Design and Networking Mechanism

Abstract

Glial cells, also known as neuroglia or glia, are non-neuronal cells providing support and protection for neurons in the central nervous system (CNS). They also act as supportive cells in the brain. Among a variety of glial cells, the star-shaped glial cells, i.e., astrocytes, are the largest cell population in the brain. The important role of astrocyte such as neuronal synchronization, synaptic information regulation, feedback to neural activity and extracellular regulation make the astrocytes play a vital role in brain disease. This paper presents a modified complete neuron-astrocyte interaction model that is more suitable for efficient and large scale biological neural network realization on digital platforms. Simulation results show that the modified complete interaction model can reproduce biological-like behavior of the original neuron-astrocyte mechanism. The modified interaction model is investigated in terms of digital realization feasibility and cost targeting a low cost hardware implementation. Networking behavior of this interaction is investigated and compared between two cases: i) the neuron spiking mechanism without astrocyte effects, and ii) the effect of astrocyte in regulating the neurons behavior and synaptic transmission via controlling the LTP and LTD processes. Hardware implementation on FPGA shows that the modified model mimics the main mechanism of neuron-astrocyte communication with higher performance and considerably lower hardware overhead cost compared with the original interaction model.

Digital implementation of biologically inspired Wilson model, population behavior, and learning

“…[13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]33 This part includes digital implementation procedure of the Wilson neuron. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]33 This part includes digital implementation procedure of the Wilson neuron.…”

“…Analog implementation of neuro-inspired systems is a logical selection. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][37][38][39][40] In the next section, the possibility of hardware implementation of the Wilson model on FPGA is investigated. Some hardware including Blue Brain, 35 Neurogrid, 32 and SpiNNaker, 36 which have specific goals and are developed to implement biological NNs, are really flexible and biologically realistic.…”

“…Field-programmable gate arrays can support an efficient programmable resource for hardware implementation of SNNs. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]33 This part includes digital implementation procedure of the Wilson neuron. Analog implementation of neuro-inspired systems is a logical selection.…”

“…It is an essential requirement of the simulation and digital implementation of the large-scale systems that mimic the biologically inspired concepts. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] The brain is a complicated system that is composed of a large number of initial building blocks, neurons, which have been thickly interconnected. Generally, a spiking neuron operates like a dynamical system, which can be introduced by a series of differential equations.…”

Digital FPGA implementation of spontaneous astrocyte signalling

“…This novel approach can be used to realize the biological neural networks in a short time with high degree of flexebility and high-speed design. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] In recent years, different FPGA-based astrocytic models have been implemented on digital boards. For example, Nazari et al 28,29 propose an improved realization of neuron-astrocyte interaction model based on piecewise linear modifications and internal multiplications.…”