Emulation of Pavlovian conditioning and pattern recognition through fully connected neural networks using Holmium oxide (Ho2O3) based synaptic RRAM device.

In this manuscript, we report on the paramagnetic Ho2O3-based synaptic resistive random-access memory device for the implementation of neuronal functionalities such as long-term potentiation, long-term depression and spike timing dependent plasticity respectively. The plasticity of the artificial synapse is also studied by varying pulse amplitude, pulse width, and pulse interval. In addition, we could classify handwritten Modified National Institute of Standards and Technology data set (MNIST) using a fully connected neural network (FCN). The device-based FCN records a high classification accuracy of 93.47% which is comparable to the software-based test accuracy of 97.97%. This indicates the highly optimized behavior of our synaptic device for hardware neuromorphic applications. Successful emulation of Pavlovian classical conditioning for associative learning of the biological brain is achieved. We believe that the present device consists the potential to utilize in neuromorphic applications.