arXiv AI

Globally Optimal Training of Spiking Neural Networks via Parameter Reconstruction

arXiv:2605. 08022v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Spiking Neural Networks (SNNs) have been proposed as biologically plausible and energy-efficient alternatives to conventional Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs).

arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 11

A2SG:Adaptive and Asymmetric Surrogate Gradients for Training Deep Spiking Neural Networks

arXiv:2606. 11236v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Training deep spiking neural networks (SNNs) remains challenging due to sharp loss landscapes and temporal inconsistency caused by surrogate gradients.

By Yechan Kang, Yongjin Kweon, Mingyeong Seo, Sohee Park, Yeonguk Jeon, Jongkil Park, Hyun Jae Jang, Jaewook Kim, YeonJoo Jeong, Suyoun Lee, Seongsik Park
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 25

On the second-order optimization for spiking neural networks

The paper introduces SpiKFAX, a second‑order optimization technique for Spiking Neural Networks (SNNs) that uses a Kronecker‑factored approximation of the Fisher information matrix tailored to the sparse, discrete, and temporally recurrent dynamics of SNNs. By addressing the sharp loss landscape that hampers training with conventional optimizers, SpiKFAX improves test accuracy and training stability across five architectures and seven datasets. The method offers a computationally tractable alternative to existing curvature‑based approaches for SNNs.

By Ngoc Phu Doan, Ihsen Alouani
arXiv AI
Jun 19

Hybrid ANN-SNN Pipeline with Local Plasticity

arXiv:2606. 20151v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: This work proposes a hybrid ANN-SNN pipeline that effectively leverages the rich embeddings of pretrained artificial neural networks (ANNs) to enable high-performance spiking neural networks (SNNs).

By Denis Larionov, Khairutin Shtanchaev, Mikhail Kiselev, Mikhail Korovin, Ivan Tugoy
arXiv AI
Aug 17

SAGE: Surrogate-gradient Adaptation via Attention-Guided Entropy for Spiking Transformers

arXiv:2608. 13702v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Spiking neural networks (SNNs) offer an energy-efficient alternative to conventional deep neural networks by exploiting sparse event-driven computation, but their training remains challenging because the non-differentiable spike function requires surrogate gradients whose fixed shape may be suboptimal across layers and training stages.

By Kiran Nair, Rodrigue Rizk, KC Santosh
arXiv AI
Sep 16

Equivalence of approximation by networks of single- and multi-spike neurons

The paper demonstrates that for a broad class of spiking neuron models, including the leaky integrate‑and‑fire with subtractive reset, any approximation bound proven for multi‑spike networks can be translated to an equivalent single‑spike network with only a linear change in neuron count, and vice versa. This establishes that single‑spike and multi‑spike neural networks possess identical approximation capabilities for general machine learning tasks. Consequently, existing approximation results for single‑spike networks automatically extend to the multi‑spike case.

By Dominik Dold, Philipp Christian Petersen
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 11

Polyhedral Geometry of Time-to-First-Spike Neural Networks

The paper investigates the expressivity of time-to-first-spike spiking neural networks, showing that each neuron's firing time can be represented in a maxout-like form with many constrained affine pieces. It formalizes causal regions as polyhedral sets defined by fixed causal spike sequences and derives bounds on the number of such regions for both shallow and multilayer networks. Experiments confirm that spiking networks can produce richer input-space partitions than conventional feedforward ReLU networks.

By Manjot Singh, Guido Mont\'ufar, Gitta Kutyniok
arXiv AI
Jul 15

Burst Spiking Neural Networks

arXiv:2607. 11914v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: A central goal of current Spiking Neural Network (SNN) research is to improve their accuracy toward becoming low-power alternatives to Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs).

By Jiahong Zhang, Sijun Shen, Man Yao, Han Xu, Mingqiang Huang, Yonghong Tian, Bo Xu, Guoqi Li
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 15

Exploring napping paradigm for Recurrent Spiking Neural Networks

The paper proposes a biologically inspired micro‑sleep technique called napping for recurrent spiking neural networks, combining proportional weight scaling with continuous stochastic membrane activity. Experiments on an unsupervised SNN trained with trace‑based STDP on Gabor‑preprocessed MNIST show that well‑tuned napping can match the classification accuracy of conventional weight normalization while offering different clustering characteristics. The study suggests that napping may be preferable when representational structure is more important than raw classification speed, despite its higher simulation cost.

By Andreas Massey, Stefano Nichele, Aliaksandr Hubin