Compact bistable CNNs based on resonant tunneling diodes

Resonant tunneling diodes (RTDs) have intriguing properties which make them a primary nanoelectronic device for both analog and digital applications. We propose a bistable RTD-based cell for the cellular neural network (CNN) which exhibits superior performance in terms of circuit complexity, and processing speed compared to standard cells. Thanks to the negative differential resistance property of the RTD, switching occurs almost instantaneously as virtually no charge transfer is necessary, and it is possible to implement commonly used nonlinear connections in a straightforward manner.