A neuromorphic circuit that computes differential motion

Abstract

Detecting moving objects in a moving background or a dynamic scene is essential to the survival of some animals. The circuitry computing differential motion is found in the biological retina. An object-motion-sensitivity (OMS) ganglion cell remains silent under global motion of the entire image but fires when the image patch in its receptive field moves differently from the background. In this paper, we present a neuromorphic circuit that compares the motion speeds of the central receptive field and peripheral receptive field. We demonstrate that there is a response if motion speeds of the central and peripheral receptive fields are different. However, the response is suppressed if motion speeds of central and peripheral receptive fields are the same.