Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40800244›Full record

ArticleNanophotonics (Berlin, Germany)2025

All-optical nonlinear activation function based on stimulated Brillouin scattering.

Grigorii Slinkov, Steven Becker, Dirk Englund, Birgit Stiller

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Nanophotonics (Berlin, Germany), 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
4citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

4 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Review
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Guided nonlinear optics for information processing.Nanophotonics (Berlin, Germany) · 2025
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Grigorii SlinkovMax-Planck-Institute for the Science of Light, Staudtstr. 2, 91058 Erlangen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1258-5854
Steven BeckerMax-Planck-Institute for the Science of Light, Staudtstr. 2, 91058 Erlangen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3323-8800
Dirk EnglundResearch Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1043-3489
Birgit StillerMax-Planck-Institute for the Science of Light, Staudtstr. 2, 91058 Erlangen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9868-9998

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Optical neural networks have demonstrated their potential to overcome the computational bottleneck of modern digital electronics. However, their development towards high-performing computing alternatives is hindered by one of the optical neural networks' key components: the activation function. Most of the reported activation functions rely on opto-electronic conversion, sacrificing the unique advantages of photonics, such as resource-efficient coherent and frequency-multiplexed information encoding. Here, we experimentally demonstrate a photonic nonlinear activation function based on stimulated Brillouin scattering. It is coherent and frequency selective and can be tuned all-optically to take LeakyReLU, Sigmoid, and Quadratic shape. Our design compensates for the insertion loss automatically by providing net gain as high as 20 dB, paving the way for deep optical neural networks.

Indexed as

Brillouin scatteringnonlinear activation functionnonlinear opticsoptical fiber; optical neural networkoptoacousticsphotonic neuromorphic computing

Identifiers

PMID40800244
PMCPMC12338876

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.