Human behaviors are extremely sophisticated, relying on the adaptive, plastic and event-driven network of sensory neurons. Such neuronal system analyzes multiple sensory cues efficiently to establish accurate depiction of the environment. Here, we develop a bimodal artificial sensory neuron to implement the sensory fusion processes. Such a bimodal artificial sensory neuron collects optic and pressure information from the photodetector and pressure sensors respectively, transmits the bimodal information through an ionic cable, and integrates them into post-synaptic currents by a synaptic transistor. The sensory neuron can be excited in multiple levels by synchronizing the two sensory cues, which enables the manipulating of skeletal myotubes and a robotic hand. Furthermore, enhanced recognition capability achieved on fused visual/haptic cues is confirmed by simulation of a multi-transparency pattern recognition task. Our biomimetic design has the potential to advance technologies in cyborg and neuromorphic systems by endowing them with supramodal perceptual capabilities.

X. ( 2021). An on-demand plant-based actuator created using conformable electrodes. Nature Electronics, 4(2), 134-142.

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Reversible resistive switching induced by an electric field in oxide-based resistive switching memory shows a promising application in future information storage and processing. It is believed that there are some local conductive filaments formed and ruptured in the resistive switching process. However, as a fundamental question, how electron transports in the formed conductive filament is still under debate due to the difficulty to directly characterize its physical and electrical properties. Here we investigate the intrinsic electronic transport mechanism in such conductive filament by measuring thermoelectric Seebeck effects. We show that the small-polaron hopping model can well describe the electronic transport process for all resistance states, although the corresponding temperature-dependent resistance behaviours are contrary. Moreover, at low resistance states, we observe a clear semiconductor–metal transition around 150 K. These results provide insight in understanding resistive switching process and establish a basic framework for modelling resistive switching behaviour.

Reservoir computing (RC), as a brain-inspired neuromorphic computing algorithm, is capable of fast and energy-efficient temporal data analysis and prediction. Hardware implementation of RC systems could significantly reduce the computing...

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The conduction mechanism of a Pd/TaOx/Ta/Pd selector device, which exhibits high non-linearity (∼10(4)) and excellent uniformity, has been systematically investigated by current-voltage-temperature characterization. The measurement and simulation results indicate two dominant processes of selector current at opposite biases: thermionic emission and tunnel emission. The current-voltage-temperature behaviors of the selector can be well explained using the Simmons' trapezoidal energy barrier model. The TaOx-based selective layer was further integrated with a HfO2-based resistive switching layer to form a selector-less resistive random access memory (RRAM) device structure. The integrated device showed a reliable resistive switching behavior with a high non-linearity (∼5 × 10(3)) in the low resistance state (LRS), which can effectively mitigate the sneak path current issue in RRAM crossbar arrays. Evaluations of a crossbar array based on these selector-less RRAM cells show less than 4% degradation in read margin for arrays up to 1 Mbit in size. These results highlight the different conduction mechanisms in selector device operation and will provide insight into continued design and optimization of RRAM arrays.

TanSat is the 1st Chinese carbon dioxide (CO 2) measurement satellite, launched in 2016. In this study, the University of Leicester Full Physics (UoL-FP) algorithm is implemented for TanSat nadir mode XCO 2 retrievals. We develop a spectrum correction method to reduce the retrieval errors by the online fitting of an 8 th order Fourier series. The spectrum-correction model and its a priori parameters are developed by analyzing the solar calibration measurement. This correction provides a significant improvement to the O 2 A band retrieval. Accordingly, we extend the previous TanSat single CO 2 weak band retrieval to a combined O 2 A and CO 2 weak band retrieval. A Genetic Algorithm (GA) has been applied to determine the threshold values of post-screening filters. In total, 18.3% of the retrieved data is identified as high quality compared to the original measurements. The same quality control parameters have been used in a footprint independent multiple linear regression bias correction due to the strong correlation with the XCO 2 retrieval error. Twenty sites of the Total Column Carbon Observing Network (TCCON) have been selected to validate our new approach for the TanSat XCO 2 retrieval. We show that our new approach produces a significant improvement on the XCO 2 retrieval accuracy and precision when compared to TCCON with an average bias and RMSE of −0.08 ppm and 1.47 ppm, respectively. The methods used in this study can help to improve the XCO 2 retrieval from TanSat and subsequently the Level-2 data production, and hence will be applied in the TanSat operational XCO 2 processing.