Energy Efficient Dual Designs of FeFET-Based Analog In-Memory Computing with Inherent Shift-Add Capability

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Yang, Zeyu, Huang, Qingrong, Qian, Yu, Ni, Kai, Kämpfe, Thomas, Yin, Xunzhao
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866914989092110336
author Yang, Zeyu
Huang, Qingrong
Qian, Yu
Ni, Kai
Kämpfe, Thomas
Yin, Xunzhao
author_facet Yang, Zeyu
Huang, Qingrong
Qian, Yu
Ni, Kai
Kämpfe, Thomas
Yin, Xunzhao
contents In-memory computing (IMC) architecture emerges as a promising paradigm, improving the energy efficiency of multiply-and-accumulate (MAC) operations within DNNs by integrating the parallel computations within the memory arrays. Various high-precision analog IMC array designs have been developed based on both SRAM and emerging non-volatile memories. These designs perform MAC operations of partial input and weight, with the corresponding partial products then fed into shift-add circuitry to produce the final MAC results. However, existing works often present intricate shift-add process for weight. The traditional digital shift-add process is limited in throughput due to time-multiplexing of ADCs, and advancing the shift-add process to the analog domain necessitates customized circuit implementations, resulting in compromises in energy and area efficiency. Furthermore, the joint optimization of the partial MAC operations and the weight shift-add process is rarely explored. In this paper, we propose novel, energy efficient dual designs of FeFET based high precision analog IMC featuring inherent shift-add capability. We introduce a FeFET based IMC paradigm that performs partial MAC in each column, and inherently integrates the shift-add process for 4-bit weights by leveraging FeFET's analog storage characteristics. This paradigm supports both 2's complement mode and non-2's complement mode MAC, thereby offering flexible support for 4-/8-bit weight data in 2's complement format. Building upon this paradigm, we propose novel FeFET based dual designs, CurFe for the current mode and ChgFe for the charge mode, to accommodate the high precision analog domain IMC architecture.Evaluation results at circuit and system levels indicate that the circuit/system-level energy efficiency of the proposed FeFET-based analog IMC is 1.56$\times$/1.37$\times$ higher when compared to SOTA analog IMC designs.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2410_19593
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Energy Efficient Dual Designs of FeFET-Based Analog In-Memory Computing with Inherent Shift-Add Capability
Yang, Zeyu
Huang, Qingrong
Qian, Yu
Ni, Kai
Kämpfe, Thomas
Yin, Xunzhao
Emerging Technologies
In-memory computing (IMC) architecture emerges as a promising paradigm, improving the energy efficiency of multiply-and-accumulate (MAC) operations within DNNs by integrating the parallel computations within the memory arrays. Various high-precision analog IMC array designs have been developed based on both SRAM and emerging non-volatile memories. These designs perform MAC operations of partial input and weight, with the corresponding partial products then fed into shift-add circuitry to produce the final MAC results. However, existing works often present intricate shift-add process for weight. The traditional digital shift-add process is limited in throughput due to time-multiplexing of ADCs, and advancing the shift-add process to the analog domain necessitates customized circuit implementations, resulting in compromises in energy and area efficiency. Furthermore, the joint optimization of the partial MAC operations and the weight shift-add process is rarely explored. In this paper, we propose novel, energy efficient dual designs of FeFET based high precision analog IMC featuring inherent shift-add capability. We introduce a FeFET based IMC paradigm that performs partial MAC in each column, and inherently integrates the shift-add process for 4-bit weights by leveraging FeFET's analog storage characteristics. This paradigm supports both 2's complement mode and non-2's complement mode MAC, thereby offering flexible support for 4-/8-bit weight data in 2's complement format. Building upon this paradigm, we propose novel FeFET based dual designs, CurFe for the current mode and ChgFe for the charge mode, to accommodate the high precision analog domain IMC architecture.Evaluation results at circuit and system levels indicate that the circuit/system-level energy efficiency of the proposed FeFET-based analog IMC is 1.56$\times$/1.37$\times$ higher when compared to SOTA analog IMC designs.
title Energy Efficient Dual Designs of FeFET-Based Analog In-Memory Computing with Inherent Shift-Add Capability
topic Emerging Technologies
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.19593