On-chip electro-optical spiking VO₂/Si device with an inhibitory leaky integrate-and-fire response

Integrated photonic neuromorphic computing has emerged as an appealing technology to replicate human brain functionalities by leveraging the benefits of integrated photonics. In this context, spiking neural networks (SNNs) offer a highly energy-efficient artificial neural network due to the event-based information processing. In this work, we propose an electro-optical spiking device for the silicon photonics platform based on a VO₂/Si waveguide and a meander-shaped microheater. A leaky integrate-and-fire (LIF) response with inhibitory optical spiking is achieved by harnessing the temperature-driven insulator-metal transition (IMT) of VO₂ combined with thermal dynamics. Hence, our proposal would not require complex electronic circuitry bottlenecking the neural network. Our numerical simulations demonstrate firing upon milliwatt and nanosecond range postsynaptic pulses and adjustable spike characteristics in the time domain with sub-microsecond values. Therefore, our spiking device could enable scalable and energy-efficient photonic-based SNNs.