Artificial sensory and motor nervous systems enabled by bioinspired nanowire heterostructure synapse

Abstract

We fabricated a p-i-n heterostructured junction synaptic transistor, composed of poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) nanowire thin-film/poly(methyl methacrylate)/ZnO nanowires (abbreviated as PZJ STs), which can emulate biological sensory and motor nervous systems. The p-i-n junction simulates complex neurological behaviors, such as reconfigurability and dual potentiation, driven by the release of different neurotransmitters from the presynaptic membrane. The PZJ STs also enabled ultraviolet recognition and color discrimination. The recognition and classification accuracy of four-character color verification codes were 96% and 92%, respectively. More importantly, the PZJ STs exhibited potentiation and inhibitory postsynaptic currents in response to negative pulses of different frequencies. The frequency-dependent postsynaptic current responses were further applied, for the first time, to construct an artificial sensory and motor nervous system that simulates the response of an organism to different sonic frequencies. The use of PZJ STs facilitate fabricating artificial sensory and motor nervous systems, extending the application scenarios and functions of future neuromorphic electronics.

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