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    Details
    Author(s)
    Display Name
    Joschua Conrad
    Affiliation
    Affiliation
    Universität Ulm
    Display Name
    Biyi Jiang
    Affiliation
    Affiliation
    Universität Ulm
    Display Name
    Paul Kässer
    Affiliation
    Affiliation
    Universität Ulm
    Affiliation
    Affiliation
    Universität Ulm
    Display Name
    Maurits Ortmanns
    Affiliation
    Affiliation
    Universität Ulm
    Abstract

    In this work, an approach for modeling the nonlinearity of a mixed-signal neural-network accelerator in training frameworks is presented. We extend the state-of-the-art by modeling a mixed-signal neuron in a neural-network training framework such as TensorFlow. It is shown how the nonlinearity can be integrated in the anyhow required quantizer models. The parameters of the nonlinearity model of a single neuron are found by a preliminary training, where the model variables are treated as learnable parameters, while the behavior of the modeled neuron is fitted to circuit-simulation or -test data. The model is never moved to another toolchain and the entire model extraction process and the process of training a neural network under the influence of circuit-nonlinearities happen in the training framework, where TensorFlow is chosen for this work. We evaluate the approach by analyzing how a full-scale VGG-16 based CIFAR-10 classifier adapts a known neuron nonlinearity. The impact of the nonlinearities can be removed by training and without performing improvements on circuit level.