An optoelectronic CMOS circuit implementing a simulated annealing algorithm

An original optoelectronic implementation of simulated annealing is presented, A compact and simple optical system provides a chip with arrays of independent random noise sources. The silicon chip is composed of a mesh of computing cells. Each cell includes both analog and digital circuits and includes two photosensors. A detailed analysis of this cell is given including a presentation of the design constraints. A 4 x 4-cells prototype chip was implemented in a 1 mu m CMOS digital technology and was successfully operated at 20 000 iterations per second. The measurements and characterization of this chip made possible the successful design of a 600-cells chip also presented. These results demonstrate the video-rate application of simulated annealing to early vision tasks.