{"title":"High-throughput systolic array-based accelerator for hybrid transformer-CNN networks","authors":"Qingzeng Song , Yao Dai , Hao Lu , Guanghao Jin","doi":"10.1016/j.jksuci.2024.102194","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In this era of Transformers enjoying remarkable success, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) remain highly relevant and useful. Indeed, hybrid Transformer-CNN network architectures, which combine the benefits of both approaches, have achieved impressive results. Vision Transformer (ViT) is a significant neural network architecture that features a convolutional layer as its first layer, primarily built on the transformer framework. However, owing to the distinct computation patterns inherent in attention and convolution, existing hardware accelerators for these two models are typically designed separately and lack a unified approach toward accelerating both models efficiently. In this paper, we present a dedicated accelerator on a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) platform. The accelerator, which integrates a configurable three-dimensional systolic array, is specifically designed to accelerate the inferential capabilities of hybrid Transformer-CNN networks. The Convolution and Transformer computations can be mapped to a systolic array by unifying these operations for matrix multiplication. Softmax and LayerNorm which are frequently used in hybrid Transformer-CNN networks were also implemented on FPGA boards. The accelerator achieved high performance with a peak throughput of 722 GOP/s at an average energy efficiency of 53 GOPS/W. Its respective computation latencies were 51.3 ms, 18.1 ms, and 6.8 ms for ViT-Base, ViT-Small, and ViT-Tiny. The accelerator provided a <span><math><mrow><mn>12</mn><mo>×</mo></mrow></math></span> improvement in energy efficiency compared to the CPU, a <span><math><mrow><mn>2</mn><mo>.</mo><mn>3</mn><mo>×</mo></mrow></math></span> improvement compared to the GPU, and a <span><math><mrow><mn>1</mn><mo>.</mo><mn>5</mn><mo>×</mo></mrow></math></span> to <span><math><mrow><mn>2</mn><mo>×</mo></mrow></math></span> improvement compared to existing accelerators regarding speed and energy efficiency.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48547,"journal":{"name":"Journal of King Saud University-Computer and Information Sciences","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.2000,"publicationDate":"2024-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of King Saud University-Computer and Information Sciences","FirstCategoryId":"94","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1319157824002830","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"计算机科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"COMPUTER SCIENCE, INFORMATION SYSTEMS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In this era of Transformers enjoying remarkable success, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) remain highly relevant and useful. Indeed, hybrid Transformer-CNN network architectures, which combine the benefits of both approaches, have achieved impressive results. Vision Transformer (ViT) is a significant neural network architecture that features a convolutional layer as its first layer, primarily built on the transformer framework. However, owing to the distinct computation patterns inherent in attention and convolution, existing hardware accelerators for these two models are typically designed separately and lack a unified approach toward accelerating both models efficiently. In this paper, we present a dedicated accelerator on a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) platform. The accelerator, which integrates a configurable three-dimensional systolic array, is specifically designed to accelerate the inferential capabilities of hybrid Transformer-CNN networks. The Convolution and Transformer computations can be mapped to a systolic array by unifying these operations for matrix multiplication. Softmax and LayerNorm which are frequently used in hybrid Transformer-CNN networks were also implemented on FPGA boards. The accelerator achieved high performance with a peak throughput of 722 GOP/s at an average energy efficiency of 53 GOPS/W. Its respective computation latencies were 51.3 ms, 18.1 ms, and 6.8 ms for ViT-Base, ViT-Small, and ViT-Tiny. The accelerator provided a improvement in energy efficiency compared to the CPU, a improvement compared to the GPU, and a to improvement compared to existing accelerators regarding speed and energy efficiency.
期刊介绍:
In 2022 the Journal of King Saud University - Computer and Information Sciences will become an author paid open access journal. Authors who submit their manuscript after October 31st 2021 will be asked to pay an Article Processing Charge (APC) after acceptance of their paper to make their work immediately, permanently, and freely accessible to all. The Journal of King Saud University Computer and Information Sciences is a refereed, international journal that covers all aspects of both foundations of computer and its practical applications.